Bombshell Aesthetics: The Most Attractive Female Body (Full Article)

(Updated March, 2015) I figure there’s no sense denying that when it comes to dating, love and relationships, well, physical attractiveness matters. We’re very visually perceptive and we infer a lot from how people look. Whether that’s right or wrong, that’s just how us humans work. The research clearly shows that whether or not people say they value physical attractiveness they still base their actions on it. Hell, even the people who truly believe that they don’t care about physical attractiveness still care about it just as much as everyone else when it comes down to who they actually date. (study, study)

These studies show that this is equally true for both men and women. Everyone places a great deal of importance on physical attractiveness. (Other very attractive traits include warmness and compassion, earning potential, etc, yet surprisingly these traits are seemingly far less important, at least at first.)

Is that the best way to pick a partner? Who knows. Probably not. However this isn’t an article about what we should find attractive, this is an article about what we do findattractive. Some of it might surprise you. Most people guess incorrectly about quite a bit of it. Just in case you disagree though, I’ll cite all my sources so that you can draw your own conclusions.

On that note, this article is long. I’ll understand if you don’t want to read the whole thing, so here’s a quick and simple trick to make yourself instantly sexier: have a drink. It will boost your attractiveness (to yourself) by 50%. This is called the reverse beer goggles effect, aka, Beauty is in the Eye of the Beer Holder. (study) Best of all, you don’t even need to have a real drink – the placebo effect is more than enough – you only have to think you’re having a real drink.

If you’re looking for a more wholesome and longer lasting aesthetic improvement, or perhaps an improvement that other people will notice too, don’t worry – that’s what the rest of this article is all about. This is an article about the biology and physiology of gut-level irresistible attraction and exactly what it looks like.

So let’s look into what’s actually optimally attractive so you can turn even more heads and drop even more jaws than you already do.

What is Sexiness?

At this point it’s probably a good idea to point out that focusing even more on our physical appearance can lead us down a path to insecurity. Sometimes cultivating a more aesthetically enlightened eye can just make us more critical of ourselves.

Always keep in mind that most guys aren’t looking at women critically. Men tend to love how women look in general. That doesn’t matter much when it comes to our own perfectionism though. Some of the most gorgeous people out there cry themselves to sleep because they’re so critical of their own physical appearance. That’s not the goal. I would prefer if you had more than your tears to keep you company at night.

What we’re talking about here is coming at this from the other side of things. Hotness, at its roots, is health and virility displayed in a very obvious and nearly impossible to fake way. In fact, this is arguably why we even value physical attractiveness in the first place. Sexiness is conspicuous health.

Exercise and nutrition doesn’t just affect how strong, lean and toned we look. That’s the positive change we see on the outside, yes, but that’s just the very tip of the iceberg. Leading a healthy lifestyle and lookin’ like da bomb also affects our longevity, mood, willpower, energy levels and all of our organs – including our brains. This is why we all intuitively assume that the cover of the book gives us clues about what’s inside.

For example, regardless of your race, healthy people’s skin looks a little different. A higher intake of vitamins and minerals (good nutrition habits), higher levels of oxygenated blood (good exercise habits) and a healthy amount of melanin (exercise, nutrition and sunlight) will turn your skin redder and yellower, giving you a healthier “glow”. It will probably go a long way to clearing up acne and improving your complexion too, but even just that ever so slightly different colouring subconsciously looks really damn hot to others. (study, study)

So, whether you’re interested in becoming the most undeniably beautiful babe on the block or you’re looking to become a smarter, healthier, stronger and more vibrant version of yourself on the inside, the methods are the same. This isn’t a makeup tutorial – the kind of physical attraction we’re talking about isn’t skin deep and, unfortunately, becoming drop dead gorgeous isn’t quite that simple.

This gets even more confusing when you start adding in all the mainstream media stuff. The mainstream media ideals when it comes to female attractiveness are often dead wrong. Not wrong in the moralistic sense of the word wrong – that’s a whole other debate – I meanfactually wrong. They’re incorrect.

I’m not saying that the mainstream media is dumb. They’re not. They’re actually very clever. It’s not that they’re missing the whole point of physical attractiveness, it’s just that they’ve got a different target market. They aren’t marketing female bodies to men, they’re marketing female bodies to women. Very different market. We’ll talk about that a little bit later, but super health won’t necessarily get you as far with women as it will with men, since women are often competing based on different physical traits that aren’t relevant to physical attractiveness.

Now, on to understanding (and achieving) the ultimately attractive head-turning jaw-droppingly-hot female physique … which just so happens to be the most healthy and wholesome physique imaginable too:

Body types and the ideal female weight.

First, let’s take a look at a few everyday body types. The vast majority of women fall somewhere on this spectrum:

None of these women look morbidly obese or like they’ve been in a starvation experiment or anything, and these aren’t unhealthy or unattractive body types – far from it. These women look good, attractive and healthy, they just don’t necessarily look remarkably healthy.

The funny thing is, they may actually be remarkably healthy. For example, the thin gal may have a slender bone structure, have a naturally small appetite, eat lots of nutritious foods, and really enjoy forms of exercise that make her smaller – jogging, yoga, aerobics, etc. She may be in amazing shape even though she doesn’t look that strong or curvaceous.

Similarly, the naturally heavier gal may be a professional rugby player who exercises for several hours each day and eats a ton of nutritious food. She may be in excellent shape and excellent health, just with a higher body fat percentage.

… Or they may not be. The thin gal may be someone who doesn’t eat well enough to support muscle growth or someone who doesn’t exercise at all. Since muscle is so closely correlated with strength, she surely isn’t as strong as she could be.

And the plumper gal may be someone who doesn’t eat well, eats too much and doesn’t exercise. Since excess weight around the midsection is so closely correlated with health problems, if her lifestyle isn’t a healthy one she may be flirting with something like heart disease or diabetes.

These girls may be healthy, but they aren’t conspicuously healthy. Whether our instinctual judgements are fair or not, it’s hard to tell.

There’s nothing wrong with looking like a gal of average health who’ll live till she’s 81, but looking like the national average sure won’t get you noticed … especially when there are the rarer and more remarkable physiques of women who look like they’ll surely live to 120:

Obviously what size you’ll look and feel your best at varies depending on your body type and bone structure. Girls who are naturally thin are often able to build up enough muscle to look “slim & fit” very quickly, then could gradually work their way up to looking “strong & toned” … but it may be nearly impossible for them to rock the “strong & curvy” physique shown on the right. (example)

Similarly, someone who’s naturally voluptuous can usually become “strong & curvy” fairly quickly just by losing a bit of body fat … but may never be able to rock the very slim physique shown on the far left. (example)

With these three physiques, what men see is someone who only needs to make one trip with all of the grocery bags, someone who can easily muscle open up an old jar of honey with a sticky rim that’s keeping the damn lid glued on, someone who will make our best friends a little bit jealous, someone who can pick us up and carry us to the doctor if we get the flu, and someone who will surely pass all these impressive traits and abilities down to the next generation.

All of a sudden we’re struggling to get our hearts out of our stomachs, because that’s the kind of vibrant health and strength that we’re irresistibly drawn to.

It’s also rare enough that it stands out in a crowd. If head turning and jaw dropping is your goal, that’s important.

Most women will have a preference for the gal on the left.With lots of media exposure (a passion for fashion, say) you may have a preference for even thinner women than shown here. Men, on the other hand, more often love the look of fairly strong women, since visible strength makes people look even healthier and more capable.

Why don’t male and female ideals line up? Just like men are taking the “muscle is masculine” thing to extreme levels, female fashion and pop culture are taking the “slenderness is feminine” thing to extreme levels. Women do dig men with some lean muscle mass, and men do dig women who are healthfully slender … but only within the realm of healthful normalcy.

Women who are fashion models (or who are exposed to photos of a lot of fashion models) often want to be fashion-model-thin. Similarly, men who are bodybuilders (or exposed to photos of a lot of bodybuilders) often want to be bodybuilder-big. This is a well known and well researched phenomenon. In more extreme cases, it can cause psychological issues, often causing steroid abuse in men and eating disorders in women. (study)

Is being incredibly thin or super enormously muscular impressive? Hell yes. These are people devoting an incredible amount of time and energy to their hobbies.

Is this the way to become maximally attractive? No. Male bodybuilders appeal to men and women who are into bodybuilding. Female fashion models appeal to other models and fashion designers and such. They don’t suffer for attention from the opposite sex – there are plenty of people who adore these exaggerated physiques – but they aren’t good at attracting the majority of the opposite sex.

So just like you probably want your lover to be strong and healthy but not ridiculously so, well, so do we. We prefer women of average healthy weight. Totally average BMI. No need to get your freak on, Missy Elliot, we prefer a pretty run of the mill bodyweight. (study)

Now if “average” healthy weight sounds a little too good to be true … well you have a point. We aren’t talking about looking like the average girl – she doesn’t eat well and she doesn’t exercise. We aren’t even talking about the average healthy girl, who may eat well, exercise, and weigh a healthy amount. What we’re talking about is someone who’s the same weight as your average healthy gal, but far more conspicuously healthy in appearance.

Not in an obsessive or unhealthy way, mind – we’re talking about women who are really thriving in their bodies here. They’re lively, energetic, vibrant, strong, fast – and they look it. Instead of subconsciously wondering about the possible ailments that may come about due to poor nutrition and exercise habits, we subconsciously assume that your ridiculous degree of hotness means total perfect health:

So by conspicuously healthy I mean the type of health that makes guys glide their sunglasses down to the bottom of their noses and say “damn … that girl’s heeeeeealthy*!” – that kind of healthy. And that kind of health is a pretty hard to achieve in a society where the scent of Cinnabon wafts through the air as you’re hustling from your bed to your car to your office chair. Life’s hard. #firstworldproblems

Now I’m not saying that average bodies aren’t attractive – they are – what I’m saying is that they aren’t necessarily invading our minds with the uncontrollable urges that a fiery hot impressively healthy gal would. They just aren’t the bodies whose scents draw us compulsively in like a freshly baked Cinnabon. They might be amazing people, drawing us in like broccoli, because we know that’s where the wholesome amazingness is to be had … but you can totally get the best of all worlds and become a delicious fresh wild blueberry – impulsively delicious like a Cinnabon and totally wholesome on the inside and in the longterm.

(I’m sorry for the weird food references. The talk of Cinnabons kind of made me hungry.)

– Anyway, many cubicle latte babes are furiously struggling to become underweight. They’re working their asses off, not realizing that it’s usually better to work their asses on. It’s not even that they’re lazy – they’re often trying really damn hard! Like, harder than most men could possibly even imagine.

It’s just that if you’re a woman, well, when you look into exercise and nutrition all you tend to find is weight loss information. Even the muscle-building stuff seems to be aimed at people trying to lose weight overall.

What does this do? Well perpetually battling to become underweight doesn’t make you stronger. Leaner? Yes, well, sometimes, kind of. More often than not it makes you lighter – smaller.

They’re starting to look into the psychological side-effects of this mainstream desire to become physically smaller, and it’s a little scary. For example, it seems like eating less food is directly linked with submissive body language. Trying to diet down to a smaller body is not just reducing women’s physical strength, it’s possibly also reducing their social confidence? (study)

Moreover, since the average healthy weight is considered optimally attractive, this means that if you’re already of average weight (or below) then getting skinnier, smaller or littler won’t really get you any closer to becoming as attractive as you can be, and in fact it’s more likely to take you further away.

Oftentimes efforts to lose weight are combined with cardio, aerobics or yoga. All great forms of exercise with loads of health benefits, but combined with a calorie deficit and in absence of any heavy weightlifting … they’re atrocious when it comes to preserving muscular size, strength, power and speed. (study, study, study) So the underweight warriors often aren’t the toned kind of lean that made every man in the world fall in love with Jessica Biel when she buffed up for her role as a warrior:

That’s because Jessica Biel isn’t underweight. She’s not skinny. She’s not even “thin”. She’s fit as hell, but she’s also average weight in a visibly healthy way. And men don’t dig her bod’ because she has abs – she doesn’t have abs – they dig her bod’ because she has strong confident shoulders, glutes that can crack walnuts, and legs strong enough that she could probably pick up a runway model, put her on her shoulders and squat her for at least two reps. And she looks like she eats. She looks like she eats a whole helluva lot. You can’t build muscle like that by just crunching on carrots and munching on cupcakes.

And that’s why our jaws drop: she’s strong, healthy and vibrant. She doesn’t look like she spends her day nibbling on croissants in bed while browsing Facebook on her smartphone, she looks like she just beat her boyfriend in a decathlon and then had a wholesome feast to celebrate. And then some dessert.

(You don’t need to have guns as big as hers to be optimally attractive – it looks like she did a lot of focused arm and shoulder work to really create that distinctive look – but hey badass biceps certainly don’t hurt either.)

It’s not like being slender is unattractive – of course it isn’t – but many women still underrate the value of visible strength.

So … average healthy weight isn’t as common as you might think. But it’s actually not that hard to be remarkable either. We’re not talking about needing to train six times per week, or live on broccoli and chicken. We’re talking about genuinely living a healthy lifestyle in a way that will make you look like you genuinely live a healthy lifestyle. That takes cleverness, but it doesn’t take that much time, that much obsession, or that many sacrifices.

Many people take the other approach, actively trying to ignore this strength, fitness and nutrition stuff, telling themselves that their lifestyle just doesn’t have room for it, that it doesn’t matter, or that they’ll get to it later.* Those rationalizations also make it hard to stand out. That’s why impressively fit physiques are so rare.

Sometimes this can take up even more emotional space than actually leading a healthy lifestyle. Now that I go to the gym a couple times per week and regularly eat well, I find I have more energy and more time… and I never need to stress about health/aesthetics anymore.

Oh – and this isn’t the time to be cursing your genetics. Yes, rad genetics make this easier, but there are many attractive body weights, shapes and sizes (and goals). With that said, the sexiest bodies are nonetheless defined by several common characteristics.

So onward into the specifics:

The Ideal Woman’s Waist to Hip Ratio

Fit young boys and girls tend to be built like string beans. They’re just kind of narrow everywhere. But as soon as puberty hits men and women are born.

Men are shaped by testosterone. Strong healthy men with high testosterone are shaped like V’s – big broad shoulders, lean stomachs, small hips. Women tend to dig that stereotypically masculine shape because it’s indicative of good strength (broad muscular shoulders), good health (small lean waistline) and you can see it at a glance. It’s the quickest (a fraction of a second) and most accurate (most physical and mental health markers relate to muscle, hormones and fat) way to get an immediate snapshot of a guy’s overall health.

Same deal with women … except not at all. Women are shaped by estrogen, and strong healthy women with lots of estrogen are shaped like hourglasses – strong broad shoulders, lean waists and very strong hips. Just like you can size up a man’s health in a split second based on his body shape, the same is true with women. Strong women are wickedly muscular in the hips and glutes, indicating fearsome strength and bone structure, and lean through the waist, indicating healthy levels of body fat. (study)

Although, interestingly enough, some women are cheating the system, using estrogen to signal to their bodies to store fat in their butts and upper thighs instead of their stomachs. By moving their fat from their tummies to their tushes they’re enhancing their hotness via their fat stores. Kind of cool … kiiind of deceptive. You tricksters.

If at this point you’re thinking “but Shane – I’m a woman and I’m still a bean!” don’t fret – you may not actually have small hips. Yes, bone structure is probably a factor, but chances are that your hips also have undeveloped musculature that just isn’t poppin’ in all the right places. Most women these days can’t perform a proper hip hinge, resulting in muscles accumulating in their lower back and quads instead of in their butts, hips and hamstrings. While the bone structure of your hips won’t change, you can certainly build up strong curvaceous hips in the gym. (Tip for the non-genetically-gifted: curvaceous hips = strong muscular hips = hips that can lift, like, hundreds of pounds.)

Here’s a great gal, Reetta, with great genetics. She preferentially stores fat in her tush. Amazing. You can see what that looks like on the left. Over the course of a couple months she got a lot stronger and lost a bit of fat. You can see what a booty built out of muscle looks like on the right:

This works well for those who aren’t genetically gifted too. I have this friend who, once upon a time, was queen string bean. People would jokingly tease her about having no hips and no butt. (Funny joke, right? Nope.) Fast-forward a couple years and her nickname is Buns, because, well … her hips are pretty damn impressive. (She got a rugby scholarship – tons of heavy weightlifting and sprinting combined with eating tons of food at the all-you-can-eat college cafeteria.)

Anyway, what’s the ideal waist to hip ratio?!

The waist to hip ratio most correlated with health is 0.7 (study), and not surprisingly that’s what’s fairly universally considered the sexiest ratio, although it varies slightly between cultures. (To measure this you would take the circumference of your waist at the narrowest point and divide it by the circumference of your hips at their widest point.)

… But this is one section where the studies really diverge, which is kind of ironic because this is the part that gets talked about the most when it comes to the most attractive female physique.

There are two things that are generally agreed upon: 1) the healthiest body composition is the hottest body composition; and 2) a stellar waist-to-hip ratio is heart-stoppingly attractive. (study)

That’s where things get interesting. Is it the being fit part or is it the bone structure part? Not all women have the same bone structure … and thus it’s possible to be a very healthy weight and still not have the “ideal” waist to hip ratio. It’s also possible to be overweight or underweight and be rockin’ a perfect waist to hip ratio.

Some studies show that wide hips and a slender waist is ideal, because that’s what instinctively looks the healthiest. (study, study) Other studies show that a healthy weight and a relatively lean waist matter more, whatever waist to hip ratio that happens to result in. (study) Either way, you’re best off taking advantage of both by rocking a healthy body fat percentage and becoming super strong through the hips. Usually they go together, after all. A leaner and healthier waist and a stronger and more muscular butt = better hip to waist ratio.

Plus, having a bodacious bottom has a whole category to itself because it makes such a profound impact on how sexy you look. There’s really no downside to filling your trunk up with junk.

But first the lean waist part:

The Ideal Women’s Body Fat Percentage

Body fat isn’t necessarily a bad thing, especially in women. I’m not saying you should be unhealthily overweight (medically this is called morbid obesity). That obviously isn’t optimally attractive. What I’m saying is that you don’t need to become unhealthily underweight or be totally ripped to shreds or anything. If you can’t see your abs in the mirror you might care, and that’s cool, but men won’t. (Visible abs aren’t essential for great health either, even in men.)

Fat is feminine. I mean, more hormonally masculine men are often harder and more chiseled than less hormonally masculine men, as higher levels of testosterone reduce fat storage in the face and body. Similarly, the fact that healthy men have less estrogen than women causes less fat storage in a man’s chest and hips. Very manly men thus stereotypically have faces and bodies defined by muscle, and it’s not uncommon for athletic guys to effortlessly maintain 8-12% body fat year round. (I.e. some healthy men have visible abs even without needing to flex them under flattering bathroom mirror lighting.)

But that’s not true when it comes to stereotypically womanly women. Women hold onto more fat in their faces due to lower levels of testosterone, hold onto more fat in their hips and breasts due to higher oestrogen, estradiol and progesterone. This means that in order to look stereotypically feminine you actually don’t need to be thatlean, just healthfully lean.

The healthy range varies depending on age (and which expert / study you consult), but most sources would agree with the following:

Dangerously underweight: <14%

Extreme (athletes and fitness models): 14-18%

Visibly and genuinely healthy: 19-24%

Average: 25-31

Obese: 31+

According to Abernathy and Black, the healthy range is between 20-30% for women … with an important caveat: “Although persons with BMIs and percentages of bodyfat above these values have an increased likelihood of being functionally obese [aka unhealthy], not everyone will be. Equally important, many within these ranges will be functionally obese.” (study)

What this means is that being strong, active and eating well may very well matter more than your body fat percentage as far as your health goes.

How can you maximize attractiveness? A certain amount of body fat is actually feminine and healthy, and being shaped by it isn’t unattractive to men, especially if those fat deposits are landing in stereotypically womanly places (boobs, butt, thighs, hips, etc).Having a leaner waist is very very strongly correlated with health and has a good chance of improving your lifespan and mood alongside your attractiveness. (study) So you’d just try to get your waist in shape.

You don’t, however, need raging abs or anything. We have electric washing machines now, so you don’t need your stomach to double as a washboard. Being in the healthy body fat range is more than enough, and if you really want to get into that conspicuously healthy zone you’d just aim a little teensy bit lower – 18-22%. Part athlete, part head-turning hottie.

Note: You can’t spot reduce fat or anything, so just leading a healthful lifestyle that has your hormones as healthy as possible + losing fat overall is the best way to achieve a leaner waistline.

Sexiness and cellulite. Cellulite is dimpling created by body fat pushing up against your fascia. I liken it to fishnet stockings vs regular stockings. Men usually have fascia more like regular stockings, so it’s very very rare for any dimpling to show through. Women usually have fascia more like fishnet stockings, so you almost always have some dimpling showing through. It’s more common than you might imagine. (Just because it’s photoshopped out of most photos doesn’t mean that most women aren’t rockin’ cellulite.)

Yes, you can minimize the appearance of it by reducing your body fat percentage, but you can never totally get rid of body fat (and your lower body is a very feminine place to store fat anyway) so for a lot of women cellulite’s just something that will always be there.

Interestingly, when it comes to what’s considered optimally attractive … cellulite really doesn’t matter. It’s not unattractive or anything. It’s a very very feminine trait – it’s caused by feminine fascia combined with feminine body fat storage patterns. You or your female friends may care (although I’d argue that you shouldn’t), but most straight men have no issue with cellulite whatsoever, since they find feminine traits in women incredibly sexy.

If you happen to find a guy who does care about cellulite, just cancel his subscription to Cosmo and his problem should eventually go away.

What’s the Sexiest Amount of Muscle

As far as overall musculature goes there’s a big discrepancy as far as what the vast majority of men find attractive (strong women) and what most women find attractive (thin women). (study) The above “strong” corresponds with what men find most attractive and the “thin” corresponds with what women find the most attractive. (study)

The male ideal isn’t surprising since, as with all the other attractiveness indicators, it corresponds with what looks the healthiest. I mean the female ideal can be healthy too, especially in women with smaller bone structures, but even then it often isn’t ashealthy, since having more muscle mass is generally great for you.

Just to be sure though I tried to dig a little deeper, and I couldn’t find anything to dispute it. There are a lot of studies showing that slenderness is attractive, but only through the waist. In those studies they were strictly measuring body fat, not muscle mass. Even then the stronger girls with bigger hips/glutes were deemed slightly more attractive. (study) As far as muscle goes men really do seem to love strong and visibly healthy women.

This may seem confusing at first. Lighter forms of exercise will train your muscles for endurance and efficiency, and give you improved lung power and cardiovascular health. These are good things – excellent for your health – and yet that style of training will obviously not make you any stronger, bigger or curvier. (You’d be relying strictly on genetics for your curves and muscles.) So why are perfectly healthy types of exercise not necessarily making you hotter?

Well cardiovascular and aerobic health is just one piece of the puzzle. It will help with other things, like not overeating and thus helping you avoid becoming unhealthily overweight, and it will probably make your skin glow a little sexier. Both of those things will indeed make you hotter and healthier … but simply being not overweight and in good cardiovascular shape is still not a complete health/hotness indicator because that’s just one part of fitness.

Muscle indicates a whole hell of a lot of other amazing things. Obviously more muscle means more strength, speed and power – and that’s healthy, impressive and hot. There’s more to it than that though.

First, building up muscle takes plenty of food, and not just any old sort of food either, it takes plenty of hearty nutritious food. This means that if you see a gal sporting badass muscles, chances are she’s feeding herself like an empress.

Second, muscle mass also makes our muscle cells more insulin sensitive. This makes becoming lean a lot easier and helps prevent a lot of obesity related health issues down the road. (study, study) The food that you eat will start being used to make you stronger, not fatter. (study) This makes you look more curvaceous in all the right places (shoulders, hips, legs, etc), making you appear more stereotypically feminine/fertile.

Visible strength is pretty undeniably incredibly healthy, since muscle doesn’t tend to hang out on girls who aren’t taking advantage of all of those benefits. Also keep in mind that hotness is visual health, and getting strong is what promotes better body composition (more muscle mass, less fat). Strength training / weightlifting / bodybuilding / etc – these are the types of exercise that result in your body adapting by becoming drop-dead-sexier.

Luckily there are many ways to capitalize on both strength and cardio benefits simultaneously, and one way is performing big heavy compound lifts in circuits and/or with relatively short rest times. So, say, slowly working your way up to being able to do a 225 pound hip thrust followed by a few chin ups. Or a bunch of pushups followed by some heavy deadlifts. Or you could do some heavy weightlifting, then do some bike sprints or an intense aerobics circuit or some such. As far as aesthetics goes, this happens to also be an extremely extremely effective way to burn fat – often much more effective than straight cardio training or straight weightlifting. (study)

Can you become too muscular? Sure, depending on what your goals are. I mean there isn’t really such a thing as “too” muscular. Even if you’re totally jacked there will be a ton of jacked guys who are into bodybuilding who think you look absolutely amazing. But there is a point where you’ll start becoming less attractive to the majority of guys. For some women, and for naturally thin women especially, this isn’t a concern and never will be – their slender bone structure and naturally slender musculature won’t ever grow so large that it would in any way ever become remotely unappealing.

… but for many women becoming too muscular for their taste can indeed happen. Reetta, the girl with great genetics that we showed up above, told us after just a couple months of weightlifting that her back was “finished”. It was as muscular as she ever wanted it to be. At that point we simply switched to maintaining strength in her back and began focusing more on other areas that she did want to work on.

On that note …

The Ideal Butt

Things are interesting when it comes to the female hub of muscularity and strength – the butt and hips. This is the focal point of female strength and where a man’s attention is instinctively tugged. According to the studies I managed to dig up, most men (60%) are more attracted to a woman’s butt than her breasts. (study)

Men are notorious, of course, for not having any idea of what they actually want, so they also tracked eye movements to see where their gaze rested … and it did indeed rest more often than not on a woman’s tush.

Why do we care about butts? There are a few theories. One interesting theory is that bigger butts lead to greater balance (lower centre of gravity) and thus improve athleticism. In order to retain agility, reserves of fat should be placed as close to the centre of gravity as possible, which is near to the navel. In men, fat can actually be placed inside and around the naval (aka in the beer gut zone). That’s not an option for women though, as your abdomen is already occupied by a uterus (and possibly a fetus!). So the next available place is on the butt, upper thigh and thorax – whatever the hell thorax means. (Thorax is by far the least sexy way to say “the boob area”.)

As a result, fat distribution is apparently a good indication of femininity and good health. Some girls get really lucky genetically, rockin’ big butts and small waists despite not being very lean or having very strong glutes. Other girls need to build their bottoms.

And then there’s also the fact that women can have incredibly powerful hips. Impressively strong glutes are a good way to spot a really athletic and powerful woman. When it comes to strength and athleticism the hips are an area where women really shine. By this I mean that they’ve got better hips than men. In terms of bone structure their wider and shaped more favourably, allowing for more mobility and strength. You can probably learn to squat and deadlift deeper and hip thrust with a lot more power than your male friends can. Rocking strong round glutes is often a natural byproduct of being a powerful healthy athletic woman.

So if you want to have a killer pair of glutes that a man will find incredibly attractive, just get a nice strong butt as shown second from the left:

You can also just get super damn strong everywhere and your butt will become enormous along with the rest of your body … but it also seems that a slightly disproportionately large butt is seen as being hyper-attractive. (study) If you want to give men whiplash as you walk down the street, you might want to thus build up an even bigger booty – a bombshell booty.

To do this you’d get your butt incredibly strong by doing extra heavy hip work, you know, like men do extra bicep curls. Steal a trick from female bikini models and use bodybuilding tricks to become totally bootyful. You’d use a variety of glute exercises (glute bridges, hip thrusts, backwards lunges, romanian deadlifts, etc) and a variety of rep ranges (from 3-20 reps).

For an example of what that might do, here’s naturally thin Ioulia getting stronger, gaining weight, and adding a few inches to her tush:

Sexiness and Muffin tops. Sometimes you can get muffin tops because you’ve got fat building up in your love handles, which is a pretty common area to store fat … but just as often it’s simply because you’ve grown too large for your clothes. If you aren’t gaining the kind of weight you want to be gaining, that can obviously be frustrating, but when it comes to building up a badass butt I would consider growing too bodacious for your bottoms a total win. (Although I do hope your jeans don’t explode in public. That happened to me once … )

Genetics? Apparently (aka this is a rumour) one reason why Brazilian women stereotypically have larger butts is because they do tons and tons of glute-specific exercises. It’s a cultural exercise trend, not just lucky genetics. The same is often true of people with great physiques. They seem like they’ve got great genetics, but really it’s just a good lifestyle they’ve developed. Genetics definitely play a role – some girls have such great genetics they don’t even need to lift – but the cleverer and more consistent you are with your exercise and nutrition, the better your genetics will seem.

Is a very big tush still absolutely optimally healthy/attractive? Of course! I’ve not yet come across a study that suggests that there’s such a thing as a butt that’s too muscular. Being strong and muscular is healthy, and the hips are actually a very functional place to carry some extra muscle. It’s actually not just a bikini model thing either. Since it will improve your balance and speed, it’s also a very sprinter-ly physique:

p.s. Sprinters also lift really damn heavy weights in order to get stronger and faster on the field.

p.p.s. In order to build a butt like this you also need to lift very well. It’s often pretty hard to use your butt and hamstrings to lift instead of your lower back and quads, and thus lifting technique has a huge impact on the shape of your hips and butt (especially if you don’t naturally have a big strong butt).

Is a disproportionately bigger bottom necessary to be healthy? Not at all. You could definitely skip that step and train using a more unisex approach that doesn’t emphasize hip strength, size and power as much. You’ll still be super healthy and super attractive, just not disproportionately bunned.

Boobs

Women often place a little too much emphasis here. This is understandable, because men find them absolutely fascinating. So fascinating that men are more than twice as likely to glance at your breasts before your face. Pretty wild / weird. While we find them fascinating though, we really don’t care much about how big they are. Really. We actually care more about the leanness of your waist and the bodaciousness of your butt. (study)

According to the researchers, “men may be looking more often at the breasts because they are simply aesthetically pleasing, regardless of the size.” That means that if you’ve got big boobs, men will love them. It also means that if you’ve got small boobs, well, men will love them. Basically, if you’ve got boobs at all then you’ve got the ability to keep men fascinated for hours, as I’m sure you already know. (Believe it or not, for us men, boobs are even better than Breaking Bad.)

The most common Google search us men make about our girlfriends’ boobs is: “I love my girlfriend’s boobs.” Seth Stephens-Davidowitz, an economist and big data analyzer, commented on this peculiar truth with, “It is not clear what men are hoping to find from Google when making this search.”

Here are some more “interesting” facts about boob aesthetics:

1. Poorer men prefer larger boobs. Generally in times when resources are lacking men gravitate towards women with higher body fat stores, of which boobs tend to be a good indicator. Even simply reminding a man that he’s poor will make him up his cup size preference. I admit it – us men are weird. (study)

Just incase that last weirdo fact wasn’t enough for you:

2. Hungrier men also prefer larger boobs. (study) Sexy tip – to make the most of a dinner-and-a-movie date, wear a push-up bra before dinner and then switch into a sports bra for the movie.

How do you pump/plump up the sex appeal of your boobs? While size doesn’t matter that much, symmetry and perkiness do. (study) Genetics help there, but both symmetry and perkiness are greatly improved by getting strong and lean. Being lean will often make your boobs smaller, yes, but this will also make them lighter, perkier and more symmetrical. Plus, since there will be less fat surrounding your boobs … they often look about the same size as they did before, just “better”.

Building up stronger pecs will make your boobs look bigger and perkier. I mean your boobs will still be the exact same size, but your pecs sit right under your boobs, so building them up bigger and stronger will push them upwards and outwards – sort of a natural push up bra made out of muscle. (Some breast implants are even done this way.) If you’re a girl with relatively small boobs this can apparently have a huge visual effect.

Posture

Quasi Modo was the only hero in Disney history not to get the gal. He was also the only guy in Disney hero history not to rock absolutely perfect posture. Coincidence? I think not. Plus, the girl they were all fighting for, Esmeralda – well she had absolutely perfect posture. As with any good true story, I think there are some valuable lessons to be learned here.

Chances are you had pretty solid posture by default but your lopsided desk-damsel lifestyle #$%& @$%#^ up real bad. Yes, some people have, say, scoliosis (curving of the spine). Well I’ve got news for you – that’s no longer an excuse. You can still take your body to superhuman levels and develop amazing posture and strength even with a few quirks. (Just make sure to ask your doc for clearance first, obviously.)

There are a ton of different defective postures out there, but the most common one is a forward tilt of the hips. It’s caused by a few things, but a big part of it is often due to weak hip extensors (aka a weak butt) and then this whole compensation pattern gets set up that wreaks havoc on your posture:

Here are two photos of Sara taken 10 weeks apart. They show five pounds gained, a bit less fat and improved posture in a relaxed position.

The hips usually tilt forward asymmetrically as well – one side tilts further forward than the other – which will cause the shoulders to tilt in the opposite way to counterbalance the lopsided hips. As a result nearly everyone will have one shoulder sitting higher and more internally rotated higher than the other. This will also make one of your boobs look smaller than the other, and one side of your lower back look bigger than the other.

The implications of improving your posture even just a little bit are pretty huge. Posture has been found to communicate even more about you than your facial expression (study), and several personality traits are subconsciously inferred from how we stand: aversion, openness, irritation, happiness and self-confidence. The slumped over position with internally rotated shoulders that most of us adopt is communicating all the wrong things: low self confidence, untrustworthiness, shyness, discomfort, etc. By building up the muscles that hold your body in a stronger position all of a sudden the impression you give off will change dramatically. You’ll appear more confident, more trustworthy, happier, etc. (study)

Posture is so finely tied to health and confidence that improving your posture will improve not only the first impression you give off, but also how confident you feel. It also makes it easier to breathe well and to breath deeply, making you calmer and more relaxed. To make things even more interesting, proper posture even changes your hormone secretions, further emphasizing all those positive changes to your mood and wellbeing. (study)

That’s okay. There’s a big difference between being stuckin that position 24/7 because you’ve got a weak glutes … and stylistically striking a pose to show off your strong glutes.

As far as strength and athleticism goes, proper postural alignment allows you to correctly transfer strength from your lower body to your upper body. This means you can lift heavier things and run faster and further when things are aligned properly … and you won’t be placing any negative stress on your lower back, tearing muscles or spraining ankles while doing it.

Badass posture will also make you look one whole hell of a lot younger. Over the course of our lives we slouch, slump and sit. Muscles atrophy, posture degrades and people gradually crumple up. You know what I mean – you’ve seen old people. You don’tneed to be seeing an old person every time you look in the mirror though.

How do you improve your posture? We’ll cover that in more detail in another post, since it’s such a huge topic. For now, think of improving your posture like building a clay vase. First you mould the vase to temporarily get the right form (developing mobility and practicing proper postural alignment) and then you harden it in the oven to make those changes permanent (aka build up muscle and stability using heavy weights).

Conclusion

It’s basic human nature to care about being attractive, so there’s no reason not to take full advantage of your physique. Being as attractive as you can be really willhelp, not because attracting superficial men is all that matters, but because love means a lot to everyone, and we’re all naturally drawn to people who are visibly vibrant, strong and incredibly healthy. Plus, actually being vibrant, strong and healthy is pretty incredible in and of itself.

We all also care about everything else, especially in the longer term. Looking and feeling great physically will not only make us radically more attractive, it’ll help us feel fantastic mentally too, which is also a huge attractiveness feature. Have you ever been moody because of hunger, pain, the flu, cramps, fatigue, etc? That stuff affects our disposition and saps our willpower. Having a body that functions well inside and out will go a very long way to affecting your disposition positively. It’s easy to be “on” all the time when your physical fitness is helping keep you calm, confident and full of energy/willpower.

What do you have to lose? Well being impressively healthy isn’t easy, and not everyone manages to do it, as much as I wish they did. It takes time and effort, and not only that, it takes time and effort doing it correctly, and doing it correctly is a lot easier said than done.

Really that’s about it. There’s no major downside and there’s no reason not to strive towards it, even if you have a newborn babe and a hubby who values your time dearly. In fact, that might be an even more powerful reason to get into this stuff. We have a lot of people report having more energy to play with their kids, more energy to take their husbands out on dates, more confidence with the guys they’re attracted to, less moodiness, more focus at work, etc, after getting their physiques under control. Looking and feeling great isn’t necessarily a narcissistic, self-centred or selfish endeavour. It can be the opposite.

It also doesn’t take that much time or that much effort if you do this stuff cleverly and efficiently. You only need to train about 3 hours per week. During those 3 hours you can do strength training and cardio simultaneously. (Who ever said you can’t get your heart rate up while lifting heavy things?), and you can work all of your major muscle groups with just a few big compound lifts. (Why isolate and work all your muscle groups individually?)

Similarly, nutrition doesn’t need to be restrictive, time consuming or expensive either. It definitely doesn’t need to taste bad. Nutritious food can be just as decadent and indulgent as non-nutritious food, and there’s even plenty of room for non-nutritious food in a healthy and balanced diet.

I’m not going to lie – getting to an elite level takes time. Getting most of the way there doesn’t though. With dedication and a good plan you’ll likely notice improvements in the mirror in a couple weeks, pop into the “super beautifully healthy and vibrant” category in a couple of months. Men aren’t looking for freaks of nature after all.

Easier said than done, I know, but these are extremely achievable goals with huge rewards, both inside and out.

Then, while already experiencing all the benefits of having a hot and attractive physique, you can gradually and enjoyably work towards building the most badass body ever over the course of several years. Just remember, as you’re in this stage, to really and thoroughly enjoy your body for what it can do. Far too often we just keep upgrading our standards as we accomplish our goals, never stopping to appreciate how incredible of a job we’ve already done.

Here are some related articles

164 Comments

latispathaon April 24, 2014 at 10:48 am

Great job Shane! As both a former journalist and current college professor – I am very impressed with how well-written this article is. Chock full of dense (and backed-up) facts, but very easy and enjoyable to read. Glossy magazine-quality stuff.

I very much enjoyed reading this article. I’m on my way back to having my belly back. I was 225lbs., 197 now. And there are a few things in this article about the eating, working with weights, and rocking the cellulite that I completely agree with. Lots of good examples to go by. Stay cool, and I’m looking forward to the next article.

Loved it Shane. I think the studies actually (accurately) promote a much better lifestyle too than what the mainstream media is presenting. Women being strong with a healthy amount of fat stores, being able to move the way they want without pain, having more energy, etc. is definitely attractive!

Another note: I’m seeing a lot of Muffin Top in these images (re: the Average Woman). A point of clarification that may make women feel better – Muffin Top actually did not exist before 2005. I definitely remember life before Mufin Top, even with the Average Woman or even slightly overweight woman. It has more to do with ill-fitting clothing and jeans that are cut wrong/too narrow and ride low and are made of poor material. It has less to do with a woman’s body type. Also, many people don’t actually wear the right size. Where some might see Muffin Top, I see a woman who might be fine, but she’s wearing the wrong jeans. If you have developed obliques, you also will get Muffin Top in the wrong clothing, but it’s muscle bulging over ill-fitting clothing, not fat spilling over. Muffin Top is an illusion in many cases.

Hehe I had that experience myself a little while back. There was a very awkward period where I had grown far too large for my pants/underwear and hadn’t upgraded to the next size yet …

It’s also very easy to see that happening to Ioulia in her before/after where she’s built up a bunch of muscle and is still wearing the same clothing as before, which is now too small. Cause for celebration in this case, I would say!

We get guys excitedly posting photos of themselves exploding out of old clothes all the time in the Bony to Beastly community, but I guess that’s not something that’s all that common to brag about 😛

I think it’d fit well next to the cellulite section, too. I’ll add it in.

Well Shane, I was reading Chris Hadfield’s An Astronaut’s Guide to Life on Earth and this article managed to pull me away from it… Kudos. I learned a lot from this and I’m seeing that getting that “Damn, that girl’s heeeaaalthy” look and feel is much more attainable than I thought! You have earned yourself another subscriber to Bony to Bombshell 🙂

I’ve followed your other blog and I’ve been waiting for this! It’s so well written and inoffensive. Haha, I’m impressed that even as a male, you provided mostly objective opinion and understanding.

I’m a weight lifting boney gal and I have researched and tried many things to gain muscle. I have sort of rationalized that I’ll never have the musculature that I want. I’m excited to get started on this. Thank you.

Pheww – I was really worried about being honest and accurately interpreting the research … while also not ruining evenings.

As you know well from our other blog, we’ve definitely been in that same bony boat. All of us have had those same worries – that we’d never be able to change it. It’s common to hear about a good half-dozen failed muscle-building attempts when people introduce themselves in the community.

AMAZING read. A friend shared this on FB and I’ve spent the last half hour reading it.

As someone who has held a gym membership for almost a decade, with an average body type, I’ve always wanted to be slimmer and thinner (like you said!). Last July, I started lifting weights for the first time, instead of always doing cardio and some body resistence workouts (but mostly cardio) and although I’m not hardcore, I try to go to the gym at least twice a week (four times would be better). Since July 2013, I have started to see muscle definition and a change in my body (what!).

I never thought that would be possible, and while there is plenty I still would like to attain through my fitness goals, it’s really cool to see all that lifting making a difference. I went on vacation a few weeks ago and posted a photo of myself in a bikini (from afar) and a fellow workout friend commented, ‘Damn girl! You are FIT!’ That felt like SUCH a compliment and SO much better than, ‘You’re gorgeous’.

All in all, I loved this article, thank you for writing this and sharing it; I feel more accepting of myself, flaws and body fat and all, and it’s motivated me to want to continue to lift (despite recently thinking, ‘Um, are my shoulders getting TOO wide?’) and be healthy and keep at it. That photo of Jessica Biel pretty much sealed the deal (with your writing about the picture) but of course, I finished the entire post before coming to that full conclusion 😉

I appreciate that you pointed out that the most attractive body is the healthiest, because it puts the goal of being strong and healthy in the foreground, and puts ‘snag that guy’s attention’ in the background. Looking good to other people is underpinned by feeling good from within, and that only happens, as you pointed out, when you work on becoming a strong and healthy woman. I’m sending this to all my friends who still insist thin is sexy and who raise their eyebrows at me for seriously working on my “thin” problem because “it’s not a real problem compared to being fat”. Anyway, thanks Shane, I look forward to your next articles!

Thanks Clarice! Hehe we got lucky – yeah. Would have been unfortunate had all the research suggested that men preferred a different kind of look!

I think it’s cool that fitness is a condition, not a look. I also think it’s cool that the “look” that the condition tends to result in, although it will be a little different for everyone, often winds up being pretty damn maximally attractive 🙂

Plus, even if you ARE working out with the goal of turning heads … you’ll wind up healthier as a by product 😉

Finally finished reading this article! So well put together Shane. Posture, lifting form, and thought towards nutrition goes a long way. I think it’s also very interesting to hear a male’s perspective on sexiness and femininity (and back that all up with research…a winning combination). I’ve found my focus had certainly shifted from “skinny” as a goal to “strong” “fit” “healthy”. Cool stuff, thanks for sharing!

Hey, nice article. As a 40+ mother of two who has struggled for a long time with this whole fitness/thinness stuff, I’m pleased to say that I appear to be on the bootilicious end of your scale – wahey! This sort of article really should be in the Cosmo style magazines (not that I read any of that rubbish), especially for some of my slimmer compatriots who are vanishing from sight. They all seem to be frantically trying to disappear, whilst I, well, I lift and swing kettlebells, medicine balls, clubs and me!

It seems like every decade puts a new spin on mainstream fitness and beauty ideals. For men, crushing a triathlon used to be the ultimate accomplishment, whereas being burly was considered brutish. Now strength is often considered more desirable than endurance. In the 80’s Arnold popularized a physique that was four times as muscular as even the buffest of older icons, like Marlon Brando. The “average” male sex icon these days is pretty damn jacked! If anything muscle mass is emphasized too much. For women, I’ve heard that the 50’s and 60’s were about being curvaceous (Marilyn Monroe), the 80’s were about the boobs (Pamela Anderson), the 90’s were about the abs (Jennifer Aniston), then came skinniness (gwyneth paltrow), and now it seems like we’re becoming all about the glutes (Nicki Minaj, Kim Kardashian)!

Hopefully that leads to a love of strength instead of littleness. There are a lot of people in the fitness industry doing great things, even though some of the mainstream sources are still negative. Maybe the next fitness trend will be a totally wholesome one and Cosmo will move a little bit away from promoting perpetual weight loss. Fingers crossed!

In the meantime, keep doing what you’re doing—sounds like you’re livin’ large in the best possible way 🙂

Hey, I just want to say I love this article! Despite its length, its fantastic and I actually read the whole thing 😉 I am definitely a naturally thin girl and my whole adolescent and early adult life I struggled with the opposite body image issues that all the other girls had. I thought I was TOO thin.

Fast forward about 10-15 yrs, and I now help others craft HEALTHY bodies. Not ‘the perfect body,’ mind you, because that doesn’t exist. I went from a weak stressed out 120 lbs at 5’9″ to a super strong gorgeous 146 and have been competing in weightlifting competitions for the last 5 years.

I did all the wrong things first, but over the years I learned that you can absolutely get results if you want to work for them….

kudos to you for this great article! if you’re interested, my blog/website is where I write about fitness, nutrition and post workout logs occasionally. 🙂

There is! Bony to Beastly. I’m naturally a very skinny guy myself, so blogging about building muscle based on my own personal experiences and research was what I started with. We had a lot of naturally skinny female readers who wanted a blog/program of their own (including my little sister), and that’s how Bony to Bombshell was born.

Thanks for this article. I’m glad knowing that exercise and being healthy play very important roles & bring good aspects in our lives. I was sprinter during schools times and we had training & spent 9 months every year for almost 10 years through primary and high schools. (school competitions). After college life and start work life’s a bit busy & I do not focus so much on exercise as I did before but one thing for sure I feel lazy , no energy and uncomfortable physically as I used being an active person.(despite of it I still had body tone though it may not so strong as before but still can see the shape as sprinter we had kind of different forms of exercise to keep with the pace, strong ,more stamina & energy). Then I come back to my normal life no matter how busy I’m i’ ll make sure I have time for exercise. The fruits of my labor for many years and I have no ideas what people perception being sexy & healthy, nice posture, or small waist line . Physically I ‘m small size not thin or plum just average by nature and I have good metabolism & appetite too neither I taking any pills to reduce weight. And no matter how much I eat I still never gain weight. I notice people always telling me fit and sexy which I do not like to be labelled as sexy . (Sorry I don’t like especially when I walk guys like to look at me , annoying coz we could never know what in his minds. I know mostly girls very proud being in attention but doesn’t mean I’m not confidence being myself but for sure more privacy ). This article also related when we are being healthy, strong physically, it ‘ll influences & transform our bodies & minds reacts,acts and response to environment around us with good manners, perceive things in positive ways and have a positive outlook on life. When I read about this article I’m glad I have done a right things in my early age involved in sporting events & and appreciate life more . Yea friends and those closed to me always said how nice if I can have a body like you. So girls,I definitely agree with this article it doesn’t necessary to be tall (I’m not tall of course mostly girls want look like a supermodel) like a cat walk model to be sexy or being confidence. It is just being who you are as long you are comfortable being yourself not some one else which isn’t who you are. Being confidence how comfortable you are with your owns physique and don’t compare yourself with other girls rather than being healthy ,glowing and strong but still look feminine.

I literally cackled out loud at this: “If you happen to find a guy who does care about cellulite, just cancel his subscription to Cosmo and his problem should eventually go away.” Great information presented in a digestible, easy-to-read and funny format. Your writing flows smoothly, you cover your bases, and you make an excellent point. Well done!

Loved this article! It is informative on the scientific level, and you related it to everyday life. Over the past year I’ve lost 50lbs and I feel and look great, not to mention so many physical issues are gone. I really like how the healthiest bodies are the most attractive and that makes complete sense considering evolution. Survival of the fittest.

After reading the male version of this article I decided to skip over to the female, pretty much expecting to see the typical schtick about the ideal feminine. But I read, and surprisingly found myself reading further, because every point made really clicked and made a lot of sense. Also this article made me think of the old me from high school that actually lifted weights, and had a very toned back and arms, and how much I miss that old version of myself. I’m in my 30s now, 5’6, and instead of hovering around 115 I now hover around 140 after pregnancy but your article makes me feel so pumped to get back on track! Of course in a healthy way 🙂 And yes good comments on posture; I want to read a lot more of your articles! Thank you so much for the motivation; definitely bookmarking this! Have a good one.

This was a very interesting article to read. I’m bookmarking it to come read again about 12 more times and hopefully at some point it’ll sink in. People will tell me I look great and fit but I truth is, I hate it. I’m 5’5″ and between 135-140 and could not care less that a lot of the weight is ‘muscle.’ When other women find out that I’m above 125 for my height, I get these pitied, horrified looks. It’s almost like I care more about the approval of other women than if men think I look attractive (I’m straight!). Anyway, 8 out of 7 days I’d rather just be skinny, even if it means I’m not technically as fit. All this to say, your article was the first thing in a long time that kind of made me stop and think. Hopefully I can change my mindset before I waste another 10 years hating everything about the way I look.

I think us men are that way too. I remember dating a girl who thought I was really muscular and attractive and thinking “yeah, but other guys still think I’m weak” and feeling really insecure about it. What you’re saying though is even weirder, since it’s the strength you have that you’d be trying to get rid of the sake of their approval.

I think the mainstream media is already starting to take a turn for the better. Strength and health seems to be starting to become a little more popular nowadays. Hopefully that continues on.

In the meantime though, hopefully you’re able to unabashedly rock the gifts that you’ve got! ‘Cause your right, from a straight man’s perspective you aren’t going to struggle with being “too fit/strong/healthy/etc” 😛

For some people reaching a 0.7 ratio just isn’t practical or realistically achievable at all, and that’s probably just fine. Even from an optimal attractiveness standpoint, some of the studies found that having a healthy body fat percentage was more important than specific proportions.

As for whether you can achieve that ratio, it’s hard to say! How much fat mass do you have around your waist? And what waist and hip measurements do you have currently?

(And for many people, losing weight would indeed be a good way to improve that ratio. It really depends on the person and their goals.)

I find this article a bit offensive to be honest. I don’t care if men find me attractive, or if my body is hourglass or having the right waist to hip to waist ration. I train purely for strength only; having a big bench, squat and deadlift. This article just perpetutates the belief that women should train for looks or that our goal is to have a flat stomach or look “sexy” for the opposite sex. As a matter of fact, lifting heavy is my way of telling society and men that I don’t give a damn about what they find is attractive. Not every woman cares about being attractive to a man. Some of us train for strength only. My goal is a big bench. Pure strength. Not achieving a “curvy yet toned” body or whatever it is that men prefer. Placing an emphasis on aesthetics is harmful in my opinion. The focus should be on performance. How much stronger are you? Oh you can deadlift 200 now instead of just 65 lbs… that’s great. That’s how we measure progress. Not as to how men might perceive us. It is already offensive enough that most men think that women train to be attractive to them (which is untrue as many women, me included, do NOT train for looks or aesthetics) but to perpetuate that with this type of article is just offensive and rubbish. You should not assume that most females train for looks or to be sexy to men. Many of us don’t.

That’s a really good point. I think that many women agree with you, and I do as well. Very much so. I definitely don’t think that women should train just to be attractive to men, and I think health, strength, fitness and happiness are much better things to strive for with a fitness (or nutrition) routine. I’m sorry if I in any way implied that aesthetics were all that mattered—that really wasn’t my intention when writing this article.

As for why I wrote this article in the first place, I asked our readers what they most wanted me to cover, and they said they wanted a female version of our article on the most attractive male body, which is one of our most popular articles for men.

Anyway, I think your goals are awesome, and I wish they were more common. And if the 65 to 200 pound deadlift is your own progress—congratulations! That’s amazing 🙂

The author is perpetutating the myth that women train only to look good for men. Many of us train for strength; a big squat, deadlift… not looks. We don’t even have a care about what men find attractive because we ARE NOT TRAINING TO BE ATTRACTIVE.

The author is offensive because he thinks his opinion on what is attractive is important enough that we should care. Newflash; women don’t work out to be attractive to you. Some of us train for strength and performance. We don’t give a damn about being a bombshell or hot. We don’t train for you or your gaze. Some of us are even stronger than you. From the photos in your “About” section you don’t even look like you lift.

@Jackie I disagree. I think is one of the rare articles on female form and body type that simply describes common perception differences in attractiveness between the sexes, backed up by scientific references. It doesn’t go on to say that women SHOULD aspire to the male preferences. Nowhere do I see the author bashing one body type over another and certainly not berating individuals for ‘lifting or not lifting’ – (everyone is entitled to their opinion but it’s more constructive to keep the debate objective).

Many of the “scientific research” cited here are unfortunately not peer reviewed…especially the ones regarding breasts. It comes more of a put down on men who like big breasts to make small breasted women feel better (I say this as a small breasted woman). Now, what if someone who releases a “study” in the internet saying that “men who prefer small breasts have pedophile tendencies?” (Which is actually a common internet joke)

What this article fail to state (which is surprising coming from a male) that men do actually have different preferences. Some men like it big, some men like it small, some men like plumpier women, some men like slender/skinnier ones, and in some cases, some men like obese women, some men like tall, some men like short. Some men like muscular and defined women , some men find that off putting.

if it is universal that what men find attractive is a small waist and wide hips, why is Kate Upton popular among many men? She barely has the ideal waist hip ratio – the very skinny models have more pronounced WHR than Kate Upton.

While the author has not directly bashed a body type and breast preference, he has reinforced many of the UNFOUNDED stereotypes. Many articles online are not really scientific especially if they are free. Most real scientific articles cost some $ to access or you find them in libraries and often times, there are studies that disagrees with that study.

Again, do men who prefer large breast tend to be poor, hungry and sexist? That is like saying that men who prefer small breasts tend to be pedophiles? In also one “study” about breasts, it was claimed that men who prefer small breasted women tend to want submissive wives….now aint that sexist? Totally contradicts that “men who prefer large breasts tend to be sexists”. Maybe men who prefer small breasts are sexists too given that they want a submissive partner?

While I do not question the intention of the author, I think that an article like this,which especially ignores than diversity in mens tastes, reinforces body image obsession. He specifically mentioned small waist and the bottom. What does that send to women who are already struggling with body image? MUst get small waist, must get round bum! Now if they did not win the “genetic lottery”, they will consider liposuction and butt augmentation to fit SUPPOSED mens ideals. Not all women can get round bottoms and small waist (compared to hips). Even glute expert, Bret Contreras, say this so in his blog. Unfortunately, the author has accidentally crossed that slippery slope

The better advise of the author would be work with what you have as long as you are healthy. Focus on healthy because if the focus is healthy, aesthetics will naturally follow. Compare that to when aesthetics is primary, it does not always follow that it is healthy. Period. No need to reinforce the STEREOTYPE that men prefer a certain body type. If you talk to guys, you’ll also see that they don’t always agree on the best body type they find in women

Also, i noticed that the author seem to equate curvy with a certain weight range rather than it being a body shape REGARDLESS of weight.

Take a look at the photo above, it says, slim, average, curvy…The word curvy seem to have been used in a PC way rather than actual meaning. The drawing on the left should have been described more a “plump” than curvy since slim, average and plump can all be curvy! It depends one bone structure( pelvic width) and fat distribution patterns (some women deposit fat in the stomach, some in the hips, some in the boobs)

I normally ignore caricatures, especially if they get personal instead of just focusing on the matter at hand, but I can’t stop myself this time. Jackie, you attack the author on generalizing what drives a woman to start lifting [which I don’t think he did], but you yourself make the same mistake in your false feminist rage which reminds me a lot of “Why women wear make-up” type of discussions.

I for one actually started this program to look more ‘aesthetically pleasing’ and feel confident about myself, it is not as black and white as you make it out to be. Probably most members start out wanting to look and feel better [be and look healthy, attractive and confident] and only then a lot of us get hooked on the ‘thrill’ of building strength week after week. So your ‘many of us’ probably completely excludes skinny girls that just want to look fuller [whether or not they’re ectomorphs], which this program is all about. I haven’t read a single thread in the forum where “I want to have an immense bench press!” is the motivation…

Only through this muscle building process did our tastes change to a more muscular female body image, which also allows our aesthetic goals and our strength goals to go ‘hand in hand’ as they say. Maybe after a couple of months some girls want to have an immense bench press, but I doubt many would subscribe if the program’s only purpose was strength gains.

What I find weird for myself is that my taste in men completely didn’t change. Made for an interesting discussion about gender, sexuality and attraction.

Love this website it has been what I have been looking for. My trainer has been treating me like I joined the gym to lose weight when I joined the gym to gain muscle! ! I was 123 at 5’7 when I started a year later 133 but he is still trying to low carb me!! Bonus though love love the new curves I have and the definition I have now!! Good thing I’m stubborn and do my own thing otherwise I would be calorie deficit and low carb all the time which means for bony girls just more of what we don’t want!!!

Dear Shane, WOW what an amazing resource you guys put together! I found you after googling ‘weight training for ectomorphs’ and I have read almost every post on Beastly and am stoked to find this for us ladies. Your knowledge and genuine caring for people really shines through. Plus you’re an awesome writer! I’m a 42 year old Chinese mum of one toddler and always loved physical activity (cardio, yoga) and have always been small boned and not much muscle. I’ve never been able to put it on (now I know from your posts that neither cardio nor yoga builds muscle that well) and I was tired of not being able to carry my daughter (and all the sundries that go with having a toddler). I joined our local gym about 6 months ago and slowly have been getting the body I’ve always dreamed of – yay! (sorry can’t share how much muscle I’ve gained since I didn’t take note of what I started out with – but now I actually have shoulder, arm and back definition). My question is that I feel I’m cursed with the Asian ‘pan cake butt’. I’m starting to see a bit more filling out but my quads are definitely getting bigger but the butt is still not as ‘bodacious’ as I’d like. Still trying to get the form of the deadlift right – and how fast should I come up once to complete the movement? I used a lighter weight to try and get the form right but I still don’t feel I’ve ‘got it’. Also any other exercises you’d suggest? I’m 5 ft 7″ and just shy of 115 pounds – about 23% body fat. Thanks!!

Congratulations on all the progress you’ve made! Sounds like you’re killing it 😀

With a deadlift you’ll want to really take the time to learn to do it properly and to practice with lighter weights, and also to be a little cautious with increasing the weights. I’m not totally comfortable giving a really short description of how to do it, since I’d hate to give you just enough info to hurt yourself, but generally you want to lift fairly explosively. (I’d really recommend watching videos and/or getting someone to teach you in person! We don’t start our gals off with a full deadlift.) The deadlift is an amazing strength lift that will work your glutes and hams, but if you’ve got weak glutes it might be your hams doing most of the work. The Romanian deadlift would be a good lift to add in, since it should build muscle size a teensy bit better than the deadlift, however it wouldn’t help balance out your glutes/hams.

If your butt is lagging behind your leg muscles you might want to add in some lifts that preferentially work your glutes. To do that, try adding in some glute bridges and hip thrusts!

Although the intention of this blogpost was good, I think people should take this article and the references with a grain of salt. I somewhat agree with Jackie here about the implication of training for aesthetics. Many bikini competitors (talking about fitness bikini competition) while they look good and healthy aren’t really healthy and often suffer eating disorders, too. (Hello make up, tanners, hair extensions). Just look up youtube for testimonies! Also I am getting the feel that this is riding the skinny bashing trend in the internet and media that I have been seeing…but at the same time ignoring the rampant obesity. People with eating disorders only make 1% of the US population, while obese people are 25%. If we include overweight people, it goes up to 75%!

Also, breast perkiness cannot be achieved by building pecs, it has more to do with skin elasticity and the ligaments that hold the breast up. And as a small breasted women, there’s a subtle bashing in the reference you cited regarding people who like large breasted women. Those articles were not even peer reviewed nor were they really scientific. In addition, what qualifies as small or large breast? Often times people just say the cup size which makes no sense since cup sizes must exist with band size. I can claim that I am a A,B,C,D,DD, cup! That is 36A, 34B, 32C, 30D, 28DD! and to be honest, these sizes are in the smaller side.

What qualifies as skinny, tender, average, fat? People interpret these words differently. In one instagram comment in an aerie photo of a model, a girl commented that the models were still “skinny”. But to be honest, she was far from skinny! She looked like she was in a healthy weight and I’d even say bigger since she seem to have a bigger bone structure. I also have been called “skinny” but I don’t see myself as skinny nor fat especially at 5’0, 107lbs. I think the concept of skinny or thin is so distorted in the US because of the rampant obesity, that even a HEALTHY slender person is being accused of being anorexic.

Besides, look around you and look at common people, how many are actually “bony”? Sure many Hollywood stars are bony but that’s not because they want to be bony but because many of them actually take illegal substances due to the immense stress in Hollywood. Even the “healthy looking” bombshell Marilyn Monroe accidentally killed herself by overdosing. And the models in women’s mag aren’t terribly bony as many claim. If you look at the cover models, they arent thinner than playboy models. Most cover models are actually actresses of normal weight. The difference is they dont have the silicon boobs that are staple in many men’s mag that often feature females. To say that women’s magazine promote eating disorders is like saying mens magazines are promoting the silicon boobs and silicon butt trend. In addition, most photos in professional photography are photoshopped. And models are models in the runway not because they are attractive – how many runway models do you think have pretty faces? Most of the runway models are unknown to most women and most women do not watch those especially that runway shows often have over the top fashion. We look more into clothing/catalog models, most of whom actually look healthily slender. The runway models are chosen mostly because they dont attract attention to their bodies, which in consequence highlight the garmet. Basically, fashion models are there because they are literally walking hangers, not “bombshells”. In addition, why is it that thinner models are being bashed and accused of promoting eating disorders and creating laws to ban them but when fat activist people insist on “plus size”/ heavier models, it is called “diversity” and is praised despite models being a few hamburgers away from diabetes?

Another thing, the coveted hourglass shape is actually the RAREST body shape. The most common are the RECTANGLES, small hips, small boobs. Even pear shaped people are about 1/5 only but more than half are rulers/rectangles/banana

One thing that amazes me about the Western world is that a lot of people are talking about going to the gym to be badass but at the same time rely of machines and modern conveniences to do chores…I dont go to the gym but I walk a lot and do lots of chores and work in retail.

Jackie makes a strong point often ignored and berated. Training solely for aesthetics is harmful. This can be seen by a higher eating disorder among fitness enthusiasts (especially those who join fitness competitions where they have to follow a strict diet in order to build muscle and cut fat). Also, there are many ridiculous “fitness advice” going on especially if the emphasis is to look at certain way in the shortest time. I have seen many “fitness mags” that shouts “get flat belly in 19 days”, “have abs in 10 days”, “have that nice but in 2 weeks”, have muscle definition in 30 days! It is to my observation that the fitness craze is heading the way of the pro-ana people. Just look at the many fitness and “health” sites that demonize carbs and even some people with health and science background are demonizing carbs especially sugar. Paleo, Zone, Atkins…these are fitness lingos. Many women with “muscle definition” are less healthy that naturally skinny people. Fake boobs are also common among fitness competitors.

I guess the bottomline is, most Americans do not really do this genuinely for health reasons but for the sake of jumping in the bandwagon. After all, I can tell you stories of coworkers who try to “eat healthy” but consume chunks of energy drink because the current fitness belief is carbs is bad. The carb is bad is not solely a pro ana mantra, it is the holy grail of some fitness subcultures.

Another thing: if men do really care about the slim waist, why is Kate Upton popular among men to the point of being featured in SI 3 times? The lady has nice boobs but she does not have waist, hips and her legs are as skinny as the runway models but with her weight concentrated in the….belly? This is less pronounced in her SI photoshoots but raw videos and unedited paparrazzi photos show her actual figure. To a lot of guys, it’s about the tits, let’s not pretend most guys prefer slim waist, or else Kate Upton wont be popular in mens magazines.

Reality does not seem to jive with what people claim. If hourglasses are the attractive ones, how come many men are marrying rectangles?

Maybe it really isnt always about aesthetics. Would men rather marry or be attracted women with “feminine curves” but act very masculine and curses a lot or a skinny/boy-like framed flatchested women but act very feminine and on feminine instincts? I think it is rather sad that the definition of feminine in the US is so superficial – boobs, hips, long hair, make up, tight clothes….but feminine grace are often seen as a “weakness” – being a dedicated mother, women who give up their career to spend time taking care of their families, being a supportive partner, excellent in cooking and household chores….to be honest, i would prefer to be a woman with no curves but exude feminine grace than be a woman who has all those curves in the right places but is more “masculine” – too competitive, insensitive, cursing a lot…. aesthetics only last a few decades and when biology kicks in, everything will sag and be wrinkly…feminine grace, however is until you die and is something you can teach your daughters.

Besides, if Americans let go of many modern conveniences, many would not need to go the the gym to get fit. Americans dont wash the dishes anymore, they put it in the dishwasher! Americans dont chop their food anymore, they buy it prechopped…

We used the best research we could find. Much of it is peer reviewed. Some is not. However we tried to look at the entire body of evidence here. It’s not like we’re cherry picking inferior studies while omitting better ones—rather we’re basing most of this on the most thorough and well conducted studies, and then trying to fill in the gaps with the clues we can glean from elsewhere. We tried to note the limitations and include our sources. If you find any peer-reviewed studies or meta-analyses or whatnot that contradict anything in this article we can reevaluate our position 🙂

We never meant to bash anyone. I’m naturally very skinny myself (6’2 and 130 pounds), and it took me a very long while to get myself up to a bodyweight that I felt confident, healthy and happy at. It’s possible that some of that is slipping into the article… but I don’t have anything at all against skinny people—if anything it’s the opposite!!

This is exactly the point I was trying to get across: “The better advise of the author would be work with what you have as long as you are healthy. Focus on healthy because if the focus is healthy, aesthetics will naturally follow.”

The reason we wrote this article was because we got so many requests to write an article about aesthetics, so I thought readers would appreciate more details and research 🙂

I also think people can train for whatever reason or goal that they want. If they want to train for an extreme sport at the expense of their health that’s their choice to make. If someone wants to incorporate a little aesthetics into their fitness/health routine—I say why not!

It seems that you cannot decide if appearance tell health or not. It some part, that is what it indicates, sometimes it is not. What the heck?

Especially with the picture you presented. Take a look at the first diagram, it says slim and FIT (Female choice). Do you know what FIT actually means? Fit has more to do with physical ability, right? And it is not an appearance, right?

You’re right. Sometimes appearance doesn’t properly indicate health. Oftentimes it does. We tried to make that clearer by saying “conspicuous” health is hot, or rather, hotness is health that’s very visibly obvious. Of course, on the flip side, sometimes people can look healthy and not actually be healthy. It’s not a perfect system, just our brains making calculated guesses based on limited visual data.

However striving towards health in a way that will make you not just healthy, but also make you look healthy… that’s a pretty sure way to be both healthy and crazy hot. I suppose that’s sort of the answer we came up with to the question we were so frequently asked—”what’s the most attractive female body?” 🙂

Seriously good job! I found some very interesting facts as well. I always suspected that a woman’s view of ‘good looking’ and a man’s view really differ, guess there is a point there. Quite enlightening! Thanks!!

This 0.7 ratio with a rockin’ butt is starting to get me down…only under 1/3 of women (8% hourglass and 22% pears) are capable of this with a whopping 70% being rectangle, apple or inverted triangle. That’s a large majority of women portrayed as less than or in need of working harder to reach an unobtainable goal. If I look around I can see plenty of those 70% somehow get married and have families so maybe it’s not a deal breaker BUT women so don’t need another item to add to their insecurity lists. Maybe being fit and happy is more important than tickling male primitive brain parts 🙂

I agree, Mel! And you’re perhaps more right than you think. Not only is the 0.7 ratio not universally supported in the studies, but it seems like simply being healthy and fit does an even better job of creating attractiveness, whether or not your ratio lines up with “the ideal” 🙂

(We go into more detail in that section. We aren’t trying to say that you need a certain ratio to be hot or happy either, and neither is science!)

While I fully agree with everything said both on here and Bony to Beastly, most of my female friends who are dissatisfied with their body tend to have the opposite issue: They’re natural mesomorphs who put on heavy muscle with little effort (gee wouldn’t we love to have that problem). The problem here is, I hate advising anyone to restrict caloric intake while not toning up- gives that emaciated look, but do you have any thoughts for girls who feel they are TOO muscly?

I’m talking starting with healthy bf%, but a ‘power-athletes frame’,think olympic softball player who wants to have a rockclimber’s body -wirey yet toned and functionally strong.

I ask because this is a difficult area where the healthiest path may not be so closely aligned with the societal ideal of an attractive yet fit female, in contrast to the bony–>fit or curvy–>fit situation where weight training yields huge gains.

It’s not rare for women to be overly developed. There’s a lot of mythology about how women have less testosterone and whatnot and could never get too muscular without steroids. But that’s not true. Women build muscle wonderfully well. It’s unlikely to happen to a naturally slim woman, just like a naturally skinny guy is unlikely to ever get “too big”.

My roommate, she’s an ex-college rugby player, and while she loves the glutes and thighs she’s developed over the years (from squats, deadlifts, sprints and such), she’s not totally thrilled about her upper body musculature and isn’t looking to develop any more.

A calorie deficit + only lifting with the body parts they want to keep large. So if they’re worried about their arms being too big, calorie deficit + not doing arm exercises. So instead of deadlifts, which are a full body hip lift that involve arm work, they’d do hip thrusts, which don’t involve the arms. Instead of doing chin-ups, which work the biceps, they’d do pull-ups. That kind of thing. Having a lower protein intake while in a calorie deficit would cause muscle loss as well.

It’s not like anyone needs to lift either. We’re not saying lifting is for everyone. If someone wants to lose muscle… why not exercise in a way that doesn’t promote muscular development instead?

If they want a sinewy rock climber body though I think a calorie deficit would probably do the trick regardless of how they lift. I bet once they got down to a really low bodyfat percentage, especially if they aren’t consciously trying to preserve their muscle mass, they’d find themselves much smaller and slenderer.

Shane, My husband emailed me a link to this article, personally I don’t spend a lot of time reading the never ending fitness posts on the Internet but I enjoyed reading this article. I’m thirty years old and at 5’2″ and 150# I’ve struggled with many people’s opinions that I’m overweight or heavy. I’ve been strength training for 2 or 3 years now and I’m happy to say that I’ve set a PR of 265# deadlift and 225# back squat and I’m still working on improving. My build is curvy, and larger than average which is to my advantage when it comes to strength. I now have a nickname that I don’t mind hearing in public “Muscles”. I read through some comments and most were very complimentary. I found that some women took issue with this article, and although you very tactfully appreciated their comments, I wanted to focus on one point that stood out to me. I noticed that some complained that they felt you made the focus of working out to be about appearances. No matter what anyone’s reason for going to the gym is, their appearance is a factor. I’ve always been muscular and larger than average, that being said I have long been torn between pride in my strength and dissatisfaction with my body. Admittedly when you are young all you want is to look like the pretty girls in school. But I think this article points to being healthy and fit as sexy. This is vastly different from mainstream media, and to change a woman’s view or to give confidence to a young woman that it is much more attractive and satisfying to be healthy and fit then a cosmo copy. This articles helps those of us in that torn mental state know that we should be proud of our strength and not worry about not looking like everyone else. I have bookmarked this article and I’m sharing it with every girl I know because I am convinced it is extremely important for women to know that they can be strong and healthy and capable and that doesn’t make them manly, or too muscled. Your article was well written,I laughed often,and I checked the studies a few times when I was surprised by a statement (even did an informal poll of my guy friends on a couple of things). This is the type of article that reinvigorates my drive to be healthy, and helps me be less concerned when the occasional negative comment is made and focus on how good my lifestyle is for me. Thank you for taking the time to write such an encouraging, funny, and informative article.

I loved your article. I read it over a period of 3 nights after working out and shared the research with my mother. We loved it! Also, the examples were great and helped support your article. I’ve been working out for a while and you have imbued me with more tips and goals!

I’m 5’5, 155 lbs. Basically i have a big butt, boobs but I’m a bit insecure about my belly. By holding my breath my waistline is 3 inches smaller. I’ve tried to lose it but nothing is working. My genes aren’t helping either cos even my skinny sister has a big belly. What do you recommend. Also my BMI is slightly overweight but I feel healthy. I can carry 20 litres of water in a bucket up a flight of stairs comfortably. Should I be worried about my BMI. One last thing, I have strong glutes and all but I dont know if I should worry about how much of it is fat or muscle.(My butt is a bit jiggly).

As far as your appearance goes, I have a feeling most people will probably notice your strengths more than your weaknesses. I would feel blessed for having the curves you’ve got, and imagine those when you imagine how you look, not your belly, if you know what I mean.

I know we tend to be hypercritical of ourselves though, so I don’t fault you for stressing over your gut… and shrinking it down might have some great health benefits too! The fat we store in our midsection is the least healthy kind of fat.

It’s common to feel like nothing is working. I felt that way for years when trying to transform myself. That doesn’t mean that nothing will work though, just that you haven’t found an effective and sustainable approach yet. Have you been able to eat in a calorie deficit, i.e., lose a little bit of weight on the scale each week? Able to get most of your calories from minimally processed whole foods? Have you been successful in sticking to a regular weightlifting program? Are you sleeping well?

Those things are all far easier said than done. I know we can’t just say “okay so eat less and move more” or anything, but if you find that one of those things is holding you back, then it makes it easier to figure out how to go about fixing it.

Your butt is probably made up of both fat and muscle. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. If you start lifting and eating well to lose the belly though, your butt will probably get leaner and more muscular 🙂

Hi – great article! I’ve recently started to weight train on a regular basis. My bf has finally convinced me that hours of weekly cardio will never change my body. After about 2 months of weight training 3-5x a week, I am really starting to see a change but I’m somewhat frustrated by how slowly the excess fat is coming off. I could really use the extra guidance that your program seems to provide but I’m wondering if it’s for me…I’m not at all “skinny.” Unless by skinny you also mean average weight with very little muscle tone? I’m 5’7″, 146lbs and at this point 29% body fat. I want to continue gaining muscle and lose my squishy belly once and for all. I actually love to work out and eat healthfully. I’m looking for a program that will enhance and improve what I’m already doing. What do you think? Thank you very much!

I know you’ve already joined us 😀 but for the sake of anyone else reading this…

Our articles are written for naturally thin gals (or skinny-fat gals) who struggle to gain weight, however right from the beginning of beta testing we’ve had members of all shapes and sizes. We help some women lose fat / lose weight and help others to gain muscle / gain weight. If someone is looking to get strong and lean we can help them do that 🙂

Having read this article and all of the comments, I’d like to say one thing. It’s foolish to think physical appearance doesn’t matter, that it doesn’t matter to others or even to ourselves. Maybe it shouldn’t matter, but the reality is it does, we have evolved to unconsciously assess a number of things about other people based on their physical appearance. We can fight against it all we want, it’s not going to change the fact that one way or another looks matter. Now, many people might actually not give a lot of importance to physical appearance (or at least think they don’t care about it) but the truth is they’re a small minority. A lot of women might not care about looking a certain way because that’s what men like (I don’t), but the vast majority of women do care about the way they look for whatever reason. In that sense, I believe this article is very relevant because it has a different narrative than almost every other article on this matter. It also teaches women who happen to be ectomorphs how to attain a certain type of physique. It might not be the body they’re interested in, but if it is it will serve its purpose.

Having said that, I’d like to know what it is exactly the guys from ‘bony to bombshell’ consider a skinny/bony woman to be. I ask because from my perspective many of the women whose pictures you posted on this website are skinny, but many are not. I should say I’m not from North America and I’ve noticed people from North America and people from Europe (where I’m from) have different ideas of what skinny is. For example, I’m 5’7”, my BMI is 18, BF is about 18%, I have naturally narrow shoulders (which I enlarged with a lot of hard work) and a 5.7” wrist, but I don’t have very long limbs (although my legs are significantly longer than my torso) and I’m not lanky. I also have a fair amount of muscle mass (naturally and obtained through hard work), few bones sticking out and what I would say is a robust bone structure. With measurements of 35-24-35 I’d say I’m a narrow hourglass. North Americans always think I’m skinny, their reaction tends to be ‘Oh my god, you’re so thin!’, but here in Europe people usually view me as thin (in a normal kind of way) but never as skinny/bony. I personally don’t think I’m skinny either, I don’t even think I’m thin. My BMI puts me at the frontier between mild thinness and normal weight and my BF is relatively low but still healthy. So what exactly is it that you think is a skinny/bony gal? How do you assess that?

Skinny/bony can be a fairly subjective thing. I was a 130 pound guy at 6’2 (16.7 BMI) and have wrists the same size as yours, so there wasn’t much debate there—I was skinny. For some people it’s not so clear.

You’re fairly thin, yeah. 18% bodyfat is very low—comparable to a lot of female elite athletes. Your weight is relatively low as well. However everyone is different. My bones are so so thin that I’m still fairly light even now that I have a fair bit of muscle and strength. My sister is the same. Very long, very thin bones. She could become much stronger, much more curvaceous, but never bulky. My mum is the opposite. Her bone structure is thicker and heavier and even when very thin her limbs were thicker and she was much heavier.

If you’re strong, fit, healthy and happy I don’t think it matters too much. Being thin / a narrow hourglass sounds great 🙂

This is hilarious and awesome! I have worked out seriously my entire life and did competitive weightlifting in high school. I am pretty small, but I always figured weightlifting would scare guys off. Nice to know it (mostly) works the other way around 🙂

This is the first time I found this website and I must say how much I really appreciate the knowledge behind this article for women who wants to build that eye-popping physique. Even though I was born really thin and had ups and downs with my weight, despite my athleticism as a girl (I played Rugby, track and field,etc.), didn’t know how effective strong glutes can be. By any chance, how long does it take to build the ideal butt? Not to mention, how often?

That depends! Even assuming that you’re doing everything absolutely perfectly, for some people it might take a few months and for others it might take a few years. (It also depends on what you consider the ideal butt to be. Building a Nikki Minaj butt might take a combination of world class genetics and surgery!) However generally the further back you start, the faster your progress will be initially. If you’re starting out with a very small booty chances are it will grow fairly quickly at first 🙂

How often? Do you mean how often do you need to train it? I’d recommend about three times per week. Maybe twice, maybe four times, but three is the sweet spot for most.

If you are a naturally “bony” women, nothing is wrong with that. A lot of guys are attracted to that look (including myself). I’m also attracted to athletic women, but for me the smaller the arm the better, even better if you have shapely deltoids. I like naturally curvy women as well, but that’s all about genetics – you can’t control where your body stores fat (huge difference in fat and curvy).

Many guys are attracted to multiple body styles. If you choose to workout, do it for your health.

I really enjoyed reading your article. It is so true. I am a natural mesomorph figure. I am white with large calf muscles and arched foot. I have the figure for ballet dancing I have been told many times as I am 5ft 3. I would say I am almost hour glass but my shoulders are slightly larger. I would not change me in anyway. I love having muscular legs. Men go crazy for them. I am lucky that they have a shape and curve at my ankles. I am a 36b and would not want to be bigger. They are in proportion to my body. Most of my training is dance classes including zumba. Having massive boobs and dancing would put a strain on my body.I gain weight quickly and lose it quickly. I was a size 8 and three boyfriends told me i was underweight. I was loosing too much from my legs, bum, boobs. Now I am a size eight to ten. But I have a bit more meat on me. I prefer this and my current boyfriend does too. I don’t get the obsession with bigger boobs. Maybe if you are very flat chested. But if not be happy with your lots. The bigger they are the more they head south in later life! Men love a woman who is a healthy weight and trains. The gym empowers me and my knowledge of nutrition too. I am very pale and I am against tanning. All skin colours glow with health. Maybe it’s all sweet potato and carrots I eat. I have clear skin that glows because of exercise, good skin care and diet. I only wear make up on special occasions. Men often go crazy for a women who has just finished a work out. No make up and glowing. You have to love yourself and work with what you were given to be the best version of yourself. Well said….bravo!

Sounds like you’ve gotten yourself in killer shape and are reaping all the rewards—congrats 🙂

I know what you mean about your skin’s healthy glow. I used to think I looked pale after a long cold Canadian winter… but now that I’m eating better and exercising, whether or not I’m tanned, I kind of glow all year long. I’ve noticed the same thing in my business partner and his wife since they started eating well and exercising as well.

I’ve never thought about it too much before, but I can’t help but agree with your argument here that a certain level of physical strength can enhance sex appeal for women as well as men. If you look at comic book heroines (most of which are drawn by straight male illustrators) for example, most of them are NOT “anorexic” or bony, but have fairly muscular physiques and body fat deposited in all the right places. I’d say they represent our ideal better than the stereotypical fashion models.

Unfortunately, like you said, most women talking about body image seem to fixate more on losing body fat than gaining muscle mass. I guess it’s because training for strength isn’t quite as easy as dieting, or isn’t seen as traditionally feminine”.

True! It seems rarer to find a straight male guy who thinks that the fashion model thin physique is the ideal. Not that there is anything wrong with being thin, or that it can’t be incredibly attractive, but thinness sure isn’t necessary for a guy to find a gal attractive, and strength can go a long way to boosting sex appeal! Given that it also (usually) boosts strength and health, seems like a no brainer for many. I think times are a changin’, and we’re going to see the strength side of fitness becoming more and more popular 🙂

Your comic book example is a good one. While those physiques (both male and female) are incredibly exaggerated (and scantily clad), it does go to show that a lean muscular look can be just as feminine as it can be masculine 🙂

hi Shane, I’ve just been wondering; there is so much talk about what good genes mean, like, everywhere, not just in this article…but there’s not really a definition of what good genetics means. I’d love it if you could define for me what is meant by good genetics. i am nearly sixteen, and have quite a curvy shape (probably the 0.7 ratio, though I haven’t measured), but haven’t lost all of my puppy fat yet 🙂 I’m right in the middle of the recommended BMI (so 21% body fat). also, i always eat just the right amount for me, I never overeat, and i exercise- and I’m a healthy weight…I feel like the extra puppy fat will drop off eventually. I know this would differ for a lot of people, but is there a certain age-range for that happening, do you know? great article, by the way. i agree with one of the comments that the focus should be on health before anything, but it does feel like an affirmation that I have an attractive body shape as I am! thanks 🙂

Good genetics can mean a variety of things depending on the context. When it comes to body composition and aesthetics it could relate to hormones (notably estrogen and testosterone), where you tend to store body fat (storing it in your butt is often better than storing it in your stomach), symmetry, how many fat cells you have, how many nuclei are in your muscle cells, the length of your muscle bellies and tendons, the size of your stomach, etc.

Lifestyle deserves more credit than it gets too. If you grow up eating well and exercising plenty, chances are that by your age you’ll find that your “genetics” are pretty good. Your active lifestyle could very well have caused your body to adapt by pulling more nuclei into your muscle cells, your hormones are within a healthy range because you’re eating well and exercising, your muscles are strong because you’ve been stimulating them for a decade and a half, you aren’t overweight because you eat enough but not too much, etc.

A “naturally” hourglass shaped woman may have simply been living the majority of her life in a way that has suited her body well. (And it’s possible for a woman who feels like she has awful genetics to become “naturally” lean, muscular and curvaceous over time.)

It just means that when most women gain weight, some of it will end up in their stomachs, but most of it will be stored in their hips and breasts. With men, however, most fat will be stored in the stomach, with smaller amounts in the hips and chest. As a result, you’ll see more guys with pot bellies than women.

This is due to different hormones. If you put a man on hormone replacement therapy, giving him female hormones, he would start start storing fat in his breasts and hips.

However everyone is different. Occasionally you’ll find a woman who stores more fat in her stomach, or a man who stores more fat in his hips/chest.

Hello, I loved reading this article. Just lost 40 pounds after 10 years of being overweight…weight I thought I would never lose. Trying to look at my body realistically and appreciate my new curves and my strength (seems as though carrying around an extra 40 pounds has put on some muscle that this weight loss has uncovered). I would say I have 10-20 to go but want to focus on keeping my sexy as I go. I am considering the program. Perhaps I missed this but in general, what is the body fat percentage that men find most attractive on women?

Men aren’t as picky about bodyfat percentage as other women, it seems. Something like 24% would be great. Depending on where you store it and depending on the man, more might be incredibly attractive too. So long as you look fit and healthy, it tends to look pretty amazing 🙂

And you’re right! Eating in a caloric surplus, which is how weight is gained, causes not just fat gain, but also muscle gain. When gaining weight you may have gained something like 30% muscle and 70% fat. Now that you’ve lost a bunch of fat, perhaps most of that added muscle has stuck around and that’s why you’ve been left with some killer curves.

When fairly overweight most weight loss is fat. However, the leaner you get, the more muscle you risk losing unless you begin lifting weights and eating a decent amount of protein. If you want to keep losing weight, I can’t recommend weightlifting highly enough. It could be the difference between losing 20 pounds of fat, or losing 14 pounds of fat and 6 pounds of muscle. The difference would be quite visually dramatic.

I hope you decide to join us! We’d love to have you. And congrats again on your progress 😀

You act as though you speak for all men. Different men like different types of women. I’ve met men who like extremely obese women (like over 350 lbs). I’ve met men who like very skinny women with no muscles, like Audrey Hepburn. You simply like women with muscles. As a woman, if I could have any body I wanted, I’d want to look like a young Sophia Loren. One could only dream. : )

I’m not trying to speak for all men, and my own personal preferences aren’t super precise. I find a great number of body shapes and sizes and bone structures and whatnot attractive. What I tried to do with this article is look at the research in order to see what the majority of men find the most attractive. In all of these studies there are always outliers. The results might be that 80% most prefer the fit looking woman, 8% prefer an average body fat percentage, 8% prefer thinner women, 1.5% prefer overweight women, 0.5% prefer 350 pound women, etc. After reading that distribution, what gets put into the article is that most men most prefer a woman who looks fit. (That also doesn’t mean that the majority of men only like women who are fit, just that they most prefer it. They may find a ton of different shapes and sizes quite attractive.)

Very few people want to be extremly muscular in men,they genreally want to be muscular and athletic like fitness models,players like cristiano ronaldo,Usain bolt etc.They look for ways for flexibilty with strength.I mean to say normally people want that they can lift heavier things and also can run. Sources : well my experience with myself and others.

Dude, that was awesome. Felt like I was in the room with bros, getting a behind the scenes scoop. I’ve come away with the notion that when you put health first, the looks and confidence comes without question. Thanks a lot. =)

What about women who have a body type closer to Kim Kardashian + 10 pounds? I have an hourglass, but am not and have never been skinny. 5’7, Natural Measurements 42-31-42. I would like more muscle but have a hard time gaining it. My husband likes my body, but after I had kids I had a hard time getting toned again. Any tips for putting the muscle back on and trimming flab? Right now I do cardio about five times a week and can do treadmill at a moderate speed for about two hours straight. I have endurance muscles (slow twitch) but not a runners type of muscle. I do some lifting but probably need to increase. I do eat healthy and have shunned fast food and soft drinks for years. Would you add on more protein and more weight training? Would really appreciate your advice!

I have had body image issues because I was a tomboy my whole life and I did not ask for the body I got. I would be more comfortable with a tall and slender frame with small breasts and different waist/hip ratio. (I have gotten the wrong attention and wrong assumptions from others because of my body type). I have been very athletic at times and train hard, but I never look athletic no matter how hard I try. It’s very frustrating. On the other hand, I have friends who don’t work out at all but who have that kind of slender, boyish body and they look “athletic” no matter what they do. (No offense to any of the ladies here, I would prefer that slender, boyish body type for myself). But, since I can’t have it, I want to know how to get more muscle. Thank you.

Hey to all the ladies out there. I wanted to tell you about some of the fitness models I know in person. These are the ladies who are perfectly cut and thin. I know one who won several awards in the mid-2000’s. While she told everyone she got her body through protein skakes, the reality was far different. She somehow built muscle but them became anorexic at the same time. She had to stop because she almost killed herself by the way she was treating her body. She looked great and was falling apart. Appearance is not all it seems.

All types of exercise will do a few great things: improve mood, improve brain performance, improve general health, improve sleep, etc.

Doing steady state exercise on the treadmill (aerobic exercise) will cause certain specific adaptations: a lower resting heart rate, better oxygen delivery, more blood vessels, etc. These are great changes for your general health, but they won’t really have any impact on how you look.

In addition to this, cardio will also burn calories, as will any activity. If this brings you into a calorie deficit, your bodyweight will go down. Most of the weight you lose will be fat, however some will be muscle. You won’t get as much muscle loss as if you were to just dieting, but you’d still come out with less muscle than when you began. Looking at the research, if you lose, say, 10 pounds, perhaps that’s 7 pounds of fat loss, 3 pounds of muscle loss.

(Running that much on at treadmill can also be hard on your joints, especially if you’re a curvier person.)

Lifting (anaerobic exercise) causes a different set of beneficial adaptations: more muscle, more strength, greater bone density. These are also great changes for your health, and they have a very direct effect on how you look. When your body is building muscle, less calories are being sent towards fat storage and more towards constructing muscle.

(About half the time spent lifting can be counted as cardio as well. So an hourlong lifting workouts will give you the cardiovascular adaptations of about 30 minutes of jogging or whatnot.)

With weightlifting, in a calorie surplus you’ll gain mostly muscle weight instead of fat weight. In a deficit the weight you lose will be entirely fat, and in many cases you’ll even build muscle while doing. The muscle will require extra calories, so you’ll actually lose fat even more rapidly because of the energy your body is spending building muscle. Looking at the research, if you lose 10 pounds, perhaps that’s 13 pounds of fat loss with 3 pounds of muscle gain. The same degree of a calorie deficit means the same overall weight loss, but way more fat loss along with some muscle gain.

With all the cardio you’ve been doing I suspect you’ve already made great cardiovascular fitness progress. You can maintain that progress with much less running. You could cut back your cardio workouts to one or two 30-45 minute jogs per week. You can then add in 2-3 weightlifting workouts (45-60 minutes each). That should maintain your cardio gains while giving you the body composition changes you want, and improving your health in a whole new way 🙂

Hi , Shane, I really enjoyed this article! I discovered it while googling , “heavy lifting and broad shoulders on women”. I started weight training with barbells ( dead lifting, squatting ,shoulder press, rows, hip hinge…) about 2 months ago. Just to give you an idea, I’m 5’3 and 140lbs. (measurements are 39-30-38) I haven’t lost weight, but I’ve lost inches since stating weight training. I’m interested in your program, because I’d like to balance my shape , as I’m an inverted triangl/goblet, but I’m not in any sense, “bony” , I’m concerned that I may end up looking more like a block if I start your program. Comments? Suggestions?

Really glad you enjoyed the article, and props for getting into the gym and lifting. Getting that routine started is one of the hardest things, and it sounds like you’re doing a great job with it. Those are all great lifts for accomplishing your goals.

Will you end up looking like a block if you join the program? Hell no. Most of our members want to build a markedly feminine physique and our program is designed to do that. It’s fairly balanced in terms of strength development, but we put some extra emphasis on the areas that will give you that hourglass shape you’re trying for, while avoiding emphasis on things like growing your obliques and abs, which will make your waist blockier.

More importantly, we can work with you on an individual level to help you accomplish your goals. You’re more of an inverted triangle so it sounds like you want some extra lower body work while not adding much size to your upper body. Bodybuilding is great for allowing people to build the shape that they want, and we can help you do that 🙂

I’m surprised some responders find this article offensive. I think it’s wonderfully written and has a great message! When I was a teenager I wanted to be super skinny like a model but I have a broad hourglass bone structure. At 5’5″ I usually weigh about 140 pounds and if I drop below 130 I actually look anorexic and my menstrual cycles stop. I actually developed an eating disorder as a teenager because of the pressure to be much skinnier than is healthy. Today I’m married with three young kids but I still want to look attractive. Yes I want to be healthy but I think a fact of life is that we all want to look good. I recently lost a lot of weight pretty fast because I’m nursing and tend to forget to eat when I get very stressed. I don’t own a scale but can feel my bones and know I need to gain some weight back. However, perhaps because of my eating disorder past I almost feel like it’s against the rules to gain weight. I’ve loved seeing these before and after pictures because these girls look sooo good! They just look so damn healthy and hot! They also look happy. I feel inspired to gain some healthy weight back and not worry about it. This article has the good message that gaunt and skinny is not nearly as beautiful or vibrant as having a healthy amount of both muscle and fat. Thank you.

We didn’t have any negativity in our hearts when writing it, so the negativity always catches me off guard as well. However, we did expect a certain amount of it. It’s a really touchy subject, and us being guys, ee, that makes it even touchier. We had a lot of requests to write this article from women who had read our article about the most attractive male physique though. Fortunately, most people have reacted really positively! It’s one of our most popular blog articles ever, with over 7,000 likes!?!

Amenorrhea (losing your period) is a risk for women with a very low bodyweight, and eating disorders are one of the most deadly illnesses that a woman can face. This societal pressure for women to become smaller and skinnier can be really dangerous. Sounds like you came out on the other side of this doing really well! Having a few wonderful kids is a dream come true 🙂

Mm, I know what you mean. I lose weight when I’m busy or stressed too. My appetite just disappears, and I need to consciously focus on eating enough. It’s pretty common with naturally skinny people. Stress hormones can make some people turn to junk food, but we just entirely forget to eat.

I really hope your upcoming quest to gain weight goes well, and thank you so much for commenting!

I was trying to figure out why the people who own this site are shaming skinny girls/women. But then I saw that it’s ran by men and realized I shouldn’t have been surprised. Even the title of the website insinuates that you can’t be skinny AND a bombshell at the same time. I’m thin myself and I do want a curvy body, but I want one so I can fill my clothes in and look the way I want to, not to please pointless men – to shame a thin body as a motivation to want to workout/gain, is bogus and you can inspire people without putting them down. “From fat to gorgeous” – sounds just as stupid. Fat and gorgeous are NOT oxymorons, neither is being “bony” and being a bombshell.

You looked into the people running this site and that’s the conclusion you came to? That we’re shaming skinny girls because we’re men? That men are pointless? Wtf.

We’re skinny guys who wanted to build muscle for much the same reason you did—to fill out clothes properly, to look the way we wanted to look. However we also don’t feel that the other gender is pointless…? I wanted to improve my physique and physical health to help me attract a great girl, and so that I could feel attractive around her. Jared wanted to be the best he could be for the love of his life—his wife. Those were noble goals for us.

Would we be bad husbands and boyfriends had we stayed skinny? No. But we saw an opportunity to be better. My girlfriend loves it, and so does Jared’s wife. I think taking care of ourselves shows respect for the people we love. Nutrition and fitness are two important ways that someone can take care of themselves.

Anyway, we blogged about our success accomplishing our weight gain goals, and over the course of a few years we helped thousands of guys build muscle and feel better about themselves. Over the course of those few years we had dozens of women asking us to make a program for skinny women. When we did, we asked them if there were any topics they wanted us to blog about. We have a popular post on our guys’ site about the most attractive male body, and they wanted a female version.

If that isn’t a good goal for you, so be it. It was theirs, but we never said that it should be yours.

I do get your point about the name of this site, however I also disagree. Our program for guys is called Bony to Beastly. Can a guy be skinny and a beast? Sure. Just like a woman can be a skinny drop dead gorgeous bombshell. But people know what the names mean—that they’re self improvement weight gain programs. Like I said, I do get your point though, and I’m sorry if you felt that I was saying that skinny people can’t be attractive. That isn’t what this article is about. That certainly isn’t how any of us feel. This article is answering the questions that our readers wanted us to answer—what’s the optimally attractive female physique? How can we, as naturally skinny people, become the most attractive version of ourselves?

We could have said that everyone is already as beautiful as they could ever be. That’s so ridiculously patronizing and patently false that it’s really not helping anyone. Everyone can become even better, and thinking that you can’t is selling yourself short. And improving one’s physique, health, fitness, strength, whatever—those are just some of many ways that someone can do that. Talking about the attraction advantages that come along with being fit, strong and healthy isn’t us trying to be mean or shallow.

Our conclusion was that looking healthy, fit and strong results in the most attractive body. I don’t believe that’s super negative. More importantly, it’s also true.

First off, this level of professionalism and insight on such a sensitive topic is unseen in the fitness world. Great job Shane.

I would like to address though: Seeing as you incorporate waist-to-hips ratios (0.7 ideal), I’m sure you have heard of the Golden Ratio (phi, or 1.618). As far as I’ve heard, an attractive qualities in both sexes is to have a waist-to-shoulder ratio of 0.618. The only reason I post this is because in your “boobs” section, which while great at respecting the different sizes amongst women and not hinting at surgery/augmentation, I did not read any parts addressing how a woman might make the top part of her hourglass figure more attractive (the bottom part being WtHR 0.7). You did hint at how Jessica Alba looked like warrior and how her well-defined upper body showed her strength, and thus her superior healthiness/attractiveness, but you did not follow up your observation with a solution for women to follow.

Therefore, I am making the humble suggestion that you give women a way to improve that top half, perhaps with exercises that promote broader shoulder expression 🙂

There’s a lot of research showing that a golden shoulder/waist ratio is ideally attractive for men. I haven’t come across any research showing that it’s equally important for women. That wouldn’t surprise me though, and you’re absolutely right—the top half of the hourglass is important as well.

What’s the best way to build the top half of the hourglass? Lifting weights. You’d build your routine around squats, deadlifts, chin-ups, rows, presses, carries. That will develop the lower and upper body. The core too. Most women will then choose a little extra emphasis in the hips, while most men will work on their shoulders, chest and arms. That seems to emphasize gender differences, which is what a lot of people are after. That’s entirely optional though, of course. Hell, all of this lifting stuff is optional.

Your idea is a good one. We’re going to have a little article coming out soon with a good balanced routine 🙂

THIS!!! This article is EXACTLY what I’ve needed to read for years! Thank you Shane!! So beautifully and concisely put together, with such a motivational emphasis on health over aesthetics. Urrgg, thank you so much for putting this together. New, pretty hardcore, fan.

I think your article is pretty decent. However, almost all of your examples sway to tiny to thin girls “beefing up”. I am tired of this narrative, really. As a curvy (not fat) woman who is a powerlifter, all I ever see is a romanticized version of the girl from Twilight as the ideal goal. Some women actually want to be bigger and stronger and not “athletic or lean”. As per your studies, as a graduate educated woman, I can tell you that men love big breasts not because they are poor or rich and they love long hair and big eyes. (Study after study proves this.) Look at Kim Kardashian and the new “plus size” models who are in fact healthy and normal size women in a range of sizes. Why don’t you post pictures of women who are actually curvy whose transformation pictures include them staying curvy and becoming more muscular? Represent? Beyonce, Kim K. And so many other women are tired of the trope of the “athletic girl with the small chest” as ideal. Please publish this and think about what curvy means with muscle ..like Serena Williams. Good article. Needs more women body type pics in your before and after. -A real curvy girl with Double D’s and 17 inch biceps.

We publish all comments so long as they aren’t spam (or cruel—but that’s never happened). We don’t even have that “awaiting approval” thing—the comments get automatically published as soon as you hit submit. I dig your comment too. You’ve got a different perspective.

I’m sorry that as a woman who’s naturally curvier you’re not relating with this article. I know this article is being shared around the internet to a more general audience, but keep in mind that this is a website for women who are naturally thin and looking to build muscle. I know we don’t post photos of curvy women who are lifting and staying curvy but this isn’t Bombshell to Bombshell, it’s Bony to Bombshell 😛

Also, we’re trying to write about what is true rather than what we wished were true. Is a naturally skinny gal as attractive as she could be without ever needing to lift weights? Oftentimes no. I’m all for thinking that people are great as they are and we should appreciate what we’ve been given… but sometimes smart, hard work can indeed make us far better versions of ourselves. And sometimes what’s best for us is not the type of work that we want to do, but rather the type of work that we should do.

As a guy who started off at 6’2 and 130 pounds it would have been wonderful if I could do what came naturally to make the most of my physique. Unfortunately, running and eating like a rabbit does not help a 130 pound dude become bigger and stronger. I needed to accept the unfortunate truth that I needed to lift weights and eat big in order to build the stronger, bigger body that I wanted. I learned to love these things because of how they benefited me, not because I was naturally drawn to them.

The same general idea is true for people with different body types, but the ideal approach may be different. Will a naturally strong, curvy woman look better with more muscle and more curves? Maybe not! There are limits to how much muscle on a woman is considered ideally attractive by dudes, just like there are limits to how much muscle on a guy is considered ideally attractive by women.

I’ve got all the respect in the world for naturally strong women who rock their genetics and go on to become incredible powerlifters, but it would be disingenuous of me to say that this would be the best way to optimize their aesthetics. It would also be disingenuous of me to imply that they care. I doubt Karpova is lifting because she wants to look better. She probably has more important things to worry about, like breaking world records.

Anyway, I really do have a lot of respect for what you’re doing, and if there isn’t an article for naturally curvy gals looking to rock their curves I hope there is one soon. Hell, perhaps you’d be a great person to write that article 🙂

Man, what an exciting and engaging read, not long at all, in fact, a little short. I like your style of writing and how you managed to keep the material as far from sexist as possible. Well balanced and informative article. Good job!

I think this site has good information and is pretty awesome, but could you point me in a direction for chubbier/fat women who want to gain these same muscle benefits?

I’ve lost 20 lbs, looking to lose another 20, but all the information I find says I should focus on fat loss and the muscle later. I’m not looking forward to looking flabby and gross after the weight’s gone, so how do you build a juicy booty and get rid of the saddle bags?

If you’re really excited about building muscle as you lose the fat then a program like this one might actually work out pretty well for you! Yes, it’s written with the naturally skinny gal in mind, but we’ve got some members who are looking to lose some weight while building muscle—looking to get leaner and stronger, rather than smaller. I think you’d like it 🙂

Loved this article! I’m getting married soon and looking to look my best for my soon to be husband. feeling a little down on some of the chub I’ve gained lately I started searching for weight loss tactics. I eat really healthy but to no avail and thought maybe eating less would work to be slimmer. Still feeling a little down I ran across this article and now feel great about myself and the way I look. Healthy and toned coming right up! Thanks!

Really glad this article made your feel great about yourself! That’s awesome. I think we’re often perfectionists with ourselves, but I suspect your husband-to-be couldn’t be happier with how you look 🙂

If you ever want more though, since you’re already eating healthy the best thing you could do for your figure is taking up some weightlifting! That will lean you out will building some muscle. Works very well. We’ve got a free beginner’s guide for that here 🙂

Thank you for your excellent and well-written article. I really enjoyed it. My question is whether you think the bombshell preference is a generational thing. I’m 46 and sometimes feel bad about how muscular I am (5’4″ 120 with a six pack and all over muscle definition, and I love to exercise but prefer push-ups, squats, etc. to lifting weights) b/c when I was in my teens/20’s, the guys preferred dating the waifs and even the girls who obviously had eating disorders. Do you think your generation really believes that strong is the new skinny? I have a daughter, and I hope she’ll embrace her build and athleticism and never fret about not looking like a wisp. Love to hear your opinion, and thanks again for the wonderful article. I only wish you had written it when you were an infant so I could have read it sooner and felt better about what I have to work with!

Hey Kay, yes! I remember reading an article (James Fell, perhaps) that talked about women’s physique trends. At some points the aerobics aesthetic was the ideal, at other times the Baywatch bod’, at other times the Britney Spears / Jennifer Aniston ab sort of physique, and now the more curvaceous and strong physique. It’s not just these “eras,” but also subcultures. If you hang out with professional male bodybuilders you might not get much attention unless you have a raging six-pack, whereas if you hang out with female fashion models any degree of muscularity might be frowned upon. You could say that these are physique “fashions,” which come and go.

However the fundamentals underneath, I would argue, remain the same. While it might have been in vogue to be thin, fit and healthy then, and now it might be in vogue to be strong, fit and healthy… both types would likely do well in both eras! So long as you appear exceptionally healthy I suspect you will appear exceptionally attractive 🙂

Strong is the new skinny is more a phrase about physique “fashion” than about human nature. Perhaps a better phrase to take away from this article is “healthy is how sexy looks.” So if you want to look very sexy, seek to look very healthy. A little leaner, a little fitter, a little stronger. This will carry over into other aesthetic areas as well. A good diet, sleep schedule, social life, and exercise routine combined with avoiding excessive indulgences in unhealthy vices will mean less inflammation, better complexion, more energy, reduced bags under the eyes, more youthfulness, etc—all things that will make one more attractive because they communicate exceptional health.

Hi Shane, I’m just a regular teenage kid and I’m not too picky about the way I look. That means I should really have little interest in this article. Actually, I LOVED it. I’m wondering why it’s not everywhere on the internet. Why aren’t you mega-famous for this?? Your research, your facts and truths are so solidly comforting and motivating it would make life simpler because people could be healthy for any reason they choose. Attractive, fit, any reason, really, you covered it all. Kind of makes me happy that there’s someone out there that cares enough to tell people this. Honestly, we need more yous out here. And people need you to remind them what’s actually attractive. I am most definitely going to be pointing people to this if they ever have a question about body types, weight, attractiveness, etc. (really, you answered so many questions I can’t even name them all). So thanks, Shane. You’ve done well.

1 I wonder what about homosexual people?I myself am not a heterosexual women and I dislike curvy female body(big boobs and bib butt),maybe because unconsciously I think curvy=feminine=not strong=submit to men?I don’t know yet, I prefer women than men as my lifetime partner.And I want to be in charge in a relationship,usually men are in charge in a heterosexual relationship,maybe that is why I prefer women? 2 And what female body most turns me on? Right now my answer is a model-like women with small boobs and boyish figure(not that tall),beautiful but not sex-arousal face,haha maybe that is my own taste.I think the reason why I choose model-like body is that in a homosexual relationship spirit is more important than sex,spiritual love is superior than physical love since inoculation is not that important between two homosexual lovers.For lesbians this maybe true,I don’t know what gay think. 3 By the way you mention the confusion between the fashion industry consistently choose thin everywhere model while most heterosexual men love curvy and more fat bodies,is it partly because most fashion designers are gay and partly because thin tall body can give the clothes a better look?

Hey Tyler, that’s a really good point you’re raising. The research I looked into pretty exclusively looked into what straight guys found attractive in women. (The gay guys were into very muscular men, generally.) As for what gay women find attractive? I’m not really sure. That’s a really good question.

I would have guessed that conspicuous health would be attractive to everyone, and to some extent I’m sure it is, but with gay guys they seem to most prefer male physiques that are beyond what’s considered optimally healthy—way more muscular, way more lean. So it’s very possible that something similar, or even the opposite, could be true with gay women.

As for thinking that being curvy isn’t associated with being strong, I would argue that the types of curves we’re talking about are very strong. Having huge glutes, for example, is an amazing sign of strength and athleticism—both in men and women. Look at any Olympian who participates in a strength or speed sport (of any gender) and you’ll see a ridiculously curvy person. Round muscles, round hips, lots of curves in the legs, etc. It’s more the elite endurance athletes / thin sedentary people who are less curvy.

To me, a relationship is less about being in charge or submitting and more about being on each others’ team. I think both partners being strong and healthy is a very good thing! I love how strong, curvy and feminine my girlfriend is, and also the strength of her spirit and convictions.

I don’t know much about fashion, but that’s a good question. I think when you treat clothes and physiques as an art form then sometimes exaggeration can be more interesting. If you look at comic books, the artists draw hyper-muscled men and women in skimpy clothing. If you look at many movie animators (e.g. Despicable Me) you get the juxtaposition of portly bodies with thin legs. In fashion you get men and women with exaggerated height and thinness. I think this has little to do with attractiveness, more to do with artistic style. The problem is that because some of these bodies are presented as ideals—partly because they exaggerate features that we’re programmed to pay attention to—many guys want to look like comic book heroes, many women want to look like fashion models. Instead of striving for realistic, healthy, attractive proportions we want these stylized extremes, you know?

The fashion designers being gay could be a factor, but it seems like the fashion industry has a lot of women who are also selecting these body types to succeed. Maybe if the fashion industry were run by straight guys the women would look like Superwoman or Kim Kardashian—still exaggerated, but in different ways. I’m just tossing stuff out there. I don’t claim to be an expert, or even to know much about the fashion industry. It’s a really interesting question!

Fantastic article Shane. Although it was lengthy no single word was wasted.

I just have one question…. Is there an exception to the rule when it comes to the ratio of cardio vs weights training for those who are naturally muscular but have excess fat to lose. Could it be suggested that girls with such genetics would benefit from a routine initially focused on fat loss via cardio? For instance a slow run for say sub 1hr to avoid catabolism. Following healthy fatloss perhaps they would be more motivated to continue with weight or circuit training as they could better see the changes their body was going though i.e muscles would be more visible due to reduction in fat layer resulting from slow fat-burning cardio. Just a thought

If someone is losing weight without lifting enough weights and eating enough protein then their chances of losing muscle are pretty high. If they already have muscle to spare then this isn’t a huge problem, although it does mean that some of the weight loss will be muscle instead of fat, slowing down fat loss a little bit. So in that case, unless they think that they have too much muscle, I think working in some weightlifting would be a good idea. It wouldn’t need to be much though. A quick heavy workout or two per week would be enough.

A cool benefit if they’re new to lifting weights is that they’ll build a little muscle while doing it, which costs calories, will drive the deficit deeper, and thus will further speed up fat loss.

That’s what I’d say would be absolutely 100% ideal though. For those who are naturally muscular they would indeed still get pretty rad results by just doing cardio 🙂

This article is fantastic!! It has really put into perspective the type of healthy body shape I should be aspiring to instead of the slim model type. Really, hats off to you Shane, this must have taken ages to write & back up with all the sources/studies! My question is, as a 200lb 5″5 female that has already lost 25lbs through calorie deficit and no exercise, how would this program work for me? I want that bombshell body I just need to work from the other direction.

Hey Jamie, really happy to hear that you loved the article! Thank you 🙂

First of all, congratulations on having lost 25 pounds—that’s amazing! If you can do that just with diet, oh man, you’re going to do crazy well once you start adding in some lifting. That will do a great job of burning calories for two reasons: 1) lifting weights directly burns calories, and 2) building muscle is calorically very expensive.

Since you aren’t in the habit of lifting weights, chances are that once you start you’ll build some muscle even while in a calorie deficit. For every pound of muscle you gain, you’ll burn an extra pound or so of fat (just because the muscle is so calorically expensive to build). Pretty cool, and you’ll be surprised at how different you look with just a few pounds lost on the scale.

We did build the program with the naturally thin in mind, however it’s also just a badass lifting program all-around. You can absolutely use it to continue losing fat. We also provide both weight gain and weight loss nutrition advice, since some degree of fat loss is a fairly common goal in the community. You’ll find other women in there working on similar goals, and you’ll have all the information you need.

Coaching and customization comes with the program too, so we can really make sure that it fits you to a T 🙂

Good read! While I enjoyed your article, it also took a hit to the ego to see what you generalize as “super attractive” or “super hot.” I have a fairly thin figure and am desperately trying to gain weight because of what the media portrays to be the ideal physique. The media has obviously corrupted me LOL.

You’re right that this stuff is all generalizations. There are people in the studies who prefer thinner or curvier women for sure, and many guys love the look of a variety of body shapes. We’re just talking about what most people prefer the most, but this does not mean that tons of guys don’t find you plenty attractive the way you already are.

I think attractiveness being so linked to conspicuous health is actually pretty inspiring, as it gives us one more incentive to do the things that will make us healthier (although there are certainly ways to improve your looks without improving your health, and vis versa).

Keep in mind that there’s nothing wrong with being thin. I very desperately tried to gain weight for many years before succeeding, and upon succeeding I realized that, a) my body type was actually pretty great!, and b) I could have felt better about my body beforehand,and I could have approached exercise and nutrition with a better attitude.

Anyway, just try to be the best you can be. Enjoy the journey too though! 🙂

This is by far the best article I’ve ever read on fitness/aesthetics- you really hit home with the psychological and emotional side of fitness that other articles (like on boybuilding.com!) never touch. So many cited studies too, very impressive ! I also had a hunch that increased health/fertility= more attractive body. Keep up the good work please !! 🙂

I love this article!!! The negative responses from some women are really outrageous. I see alot of man bashing or self esteem issues from negative posters. But the reason this article is awesome is because it is witty, sensative, and honest. It does not sugarcoat yet it encourages women to be healthy and strong and embrace that it is ok to be healthy and build a little muscle, and that curves are nothing to be ashamed of. (After reading this I measures my ratio, and it was almost exactly .7) I have given myself a hard time for being curvey, and as women we just have higher body fat than men, and this article shows that truth. I showed my boyfriend this article and he liked the positivity too. I am trying to get him to work out with me, the world needs more articles like this that focus on health of mind and confidence as well as physical health. Your articles also speak of the beauty of a sound mind. Very good read!!!!! And cute drawings of the figures. I liked the classic pinup girl look to the girl’s red headscarf.

Also, kudos to being so positive and taking care of your health to be a good partner to a girl! Alot of guys can be hateful about women having standards instead of bettering themselves. My boyfriend is very overweight, I still love him and find him attractive because I love him for him. That dosent mean I am not helping us both be more healthy. I love that you faced the truth head on and it did good things for you. Awesome sir. Very awesome

(not meaning to sound mean about my boyfriend. He is also really tall and physically active and he has attractive features) who can deny the truth that taking care of physical health leads to more happy mind frame and healthier life overall though?

Hey, I was just curious what you are considering to be the average body weight? In the US it’s something like 160, and combined with the average height it is a soundly overweight BMI. Where did you pull 140 from?

Okay I see what you’re saying. I just took the average height and plugged in a normal BMI. So a 5’4 girl with a BMI of 24 is 140 pounds. That’s on the upper end of a normal BMI, so that could describe someone without much muscle and a fair bit of fat, or someone with a fair bit of muscle and not a lot of fat. Both weight the same amount and have a normal, “healthy” BMI, but their health is quite different because of their dramatically different body compositions.

I totally get what you’re saying, though. I said “average.” And you’re right, the average person is overweight. I should have chosen a clearer word.

I am so impressed with your article.Well written and enjoyable to read…I even read to the very end! I am 63 and really need to tone up but also lose a bit of weight , about 10lbs, Do you think that this regime would this be suitable for me? Also could I do it at home or do I need gym membership?

Hey Heather, this site is pretty unapologetically geared towards women who are trying to build muscle and strength, hoping to come out stronger and fuller. However, right from the very beginning we’ve had a lot of beta testers and members who were trying to lose weight/fat. So we built that right into the program. You’ll still come out stronger and fuller, but also a lot leaner and a little lighter 🙂

This read was exactly what I needed after being told I am ‘boney’, and my bottom is obviously not. It also presented good suggestions I had not seen previously as well as some great work out reminders, on which I need to focus again.

Very misleading article. I was wanting to know what fat percentage led to the most pleasant touch. Why is the .7 ratio given so far in to the article?

Why is the fact that the ONLY non society conditioned and natural traits of attraction are male genital size and curvature of the spine in the female which relates to ability to carry offspring in nomadic cultures, which typically correlates with the given ratio?

This article should be named 10,000 words written to appease female egos regardless of body shape. Not falsely claim to posses the information regarding why some woman living similiar lifestyles with similiar body types are more attractive and more importantly feel better to touch, then others.

This is more like a bunch of reasons to find yourself attractive no matter what then it is actual information regarding attraction as an absolute on a spectrum. Thanks for the feelings. They’ve caused frustration, and a desire to refuse what the article asks for simply due to being used like an object to validate insecurity and inferiority. Oh? Is the expression of my feeling causing unwanted feelings in yourself? Funny how we could of avoided both of our feeling unwanted things, had you, the author not presented requests for having your feelings accommodated, under the guise of providing something others have asked for. Your a child asking to be humored.

“Women are shaped by estrogen, and strong healthy women with lots of estrogen are shaped like hourglasses – strong broad shoulders, lean waists and very strong hips.” The part about the broad shoulders I found particularily interesting. I have all of these traits, but thought that having strong broad shoulders made me seem to manly. Now I feel so much better about my shoulders!

As a young woman, it is refreshing to read an article like this. I workout a couple of times per week to ensure that I stay in shape. However, I use social media and the Internet quite a lot – where I am bombarded with images of models etc, and it really lowers my self esteem, especially when I go shopping. I am 5″4 and obtain a healthy hourglass figure but when ever I buy clothes, I’m a large? A UK size 14?? It really knocks my confidence and the people around me are always reassuring but I have no confidence in my body image at all. I think society need to adapt to ‘average’ body sizes, as every body is different, and I believe that sizes need to change. Maybe withing the next 50 years we might get somewhere, but while models are dying from anorexia and bulimia, we have a long way to go for acceptance.

I find this article, while well written with some good points, quite offensive. I’m tired of hearing thin girls, whether they are naturally that way or not, have to bulk up. It’s a woman’s choice about how she has her body and I feel that changing it to please a man is utterly idiotic.

I am a tall, hourglass, endomorph (aka an amazon) and I spent my whole life trying to get smaller and more delicate (dieting and cardio). This article convinced me to focus on building muscle instead (a progressive program of strength training and plyo).

I am so thrilled with the results! In a 18 months I have dropped my body fat percentage by 14% and replaced 30lbs of fat with 30lbs of muscle. I feel stronger and more attractive than I ever!!!

Thank you, Shane for your honest approach to an important topic. Fitness and attractiveness are closely linked and very important to me personally. Please know you have made a huge positive impact through this one article.

Replacing 30 pounds of fat with 30 pounds of muscle is absolutely amazing! Congratulations! I can only imagine what a dramatic visual change that must have been, and that probably pales in comparison to your newfound strength.

Hi Shane! I remembered reading this article a few years ago as a bit of an insecure 16-year-old, and it made me feel a lot better about my body to know that women are actually meant to store some fat, so thank you for that 🙂 So I’m not ‘bony’… I’ve got a curvy and muscular physique, and I’d say normal fat stores. I lose weight easily and put it on easily too. I can guess that your program is probably going to work just as well for me as it would for the body type Bony to Bombshell is actually designed for (!) but I just wanted to get your thoughts on that please? I want to make sure I’m actually making a purchase which is suitable for me! I think I’ve read before that we can do the workouts in your program at home, but I maaaay have made a mistake about that because of all the lifting that seems to be involved, so if you can clarify that please that’d be awesome. I was also wondering what you mean by ‘5 phases of workouts’ etc. in the details about the packages you offer, and what package you’d recommend for me, considering I’m not the typical gal on this program (I know, smart of me to ask someone who receives the payments haha!) Anyway, thanks so much and I hope to hear from you soon (and sorry for the number of questions!)

I’m not totally sure what your goal is, so I can’t really say for sure if the program will be a good fit for you. We focus on gaining muscle and strength leanly, in a way that will make you healthier and look better. We also help people lose fat, but even then, the focus is on maintaining muscle, strength and “curves” while losing fat. So we’re a very strength and curve-centric program, you could say. If that lines up with your goals, then yes, the program will work wonderfully even if you’re naturally more curvy and muscular 🙂

Yes, you can do all of the workouts at home. However, you’d be lifting at home. You’d need to get some adjustable dumbbells and an adjustable bench for that. (We include a how-to guide for setting up a cheap, simple and maximally effective home gym.)

When you buy the program, we’re going to give you workout sheets with exercises on them. At first we’ll give you sheets with easier variations of the exercises, and each “phase” we’ll progress you to a more advanced type of workout. During the phase, we slowly increase the volume (sets/reps) you’re doing, getting your body comfortable with more and more (good) stress. This allows you to build more and more muscle as you progress through each phase, and then when you get to the next phase, we give you harder exercises, and we start increasing the volume again. So each phase lasts a few weeks, and the more phases you get, the longer the program will be, and the more advanced you’ll be by the end. Does that make sense?

The standard package is always a good choice. That’s our “main” package, and when you last saw our website, that was the only one we sold. However, the complete package is our most popular. We made it because so many of our members were asking for a longer program.

This article came to me at just the right time on my fitness journey. I’ve been losing weight and doing some strength training with the goal of looking the best I can (for my own vanity and for my husband) and being healthy. Anyway, I’ve reached a crossroads where I need to decide if I should pursue losing that last 10 lbs to be ‘thin and fit’ or to focus on strength and doing more of a recomp. This article settles it for me, recomp it is! My husband has pretty much been saying the same thing anyway, I guess I just needed to hear it from someone else, ha.

As a 150 lb meso female, I can’t tell you how much I needed to read this! I always saw my broad shoulders as manly and my full hips unflattering; I never considered that they were a sign of femininity and health! This one of the few factual articles regarding women’s body ideals that is not only reasonable, but empowering! To top it off, the fact that it was written by a man gives me so much respect for you! So well written, thank you!

First and foremost, that was a well written, relatively comprehensive and extremely informative article. Thank you.

When I was younger, I had an almost perfect body, yet in my eyes it was horrible. Why? Because every single person around me was pushing me to be skinny, yet no matter how much weight I lost, I still had curves. Even at my lowest weight (47kg at 5’1) I hated my big boobs and broad shoulders.

Looking back, my measurements were roughly 36-26-36 which is pretty good. I had nice, soft curves and a toned figure (never muscular since I was trying to lose weight so wasn’t lifting).

Now, some years later (although not many, I’m still very young) I am 52kg, I gave birth to a child 7 months ago and am currently 3 months pregnant with another on the way (both with a lovely husband). I want to look my best for my husband as he always strives to look his best for me. However, during my last pregnancy I was constantly tired and nauseated; it wasn’t easy to say the least. I was a couch potato. I still watched my diet, hence why I didn’t gain any weight, but I feel as though I lost any and all muscle mass that I used to have. I’m no longer toned, my stomach is squishy and my butt and hips have disappeared (I’ve not exactly been blessed with an ample backside). Has all my hard work been undone due to my pregnancy? If I work hard again, and then go on to have another difficult pregnancy, will my hard work just go to waste and be for naught? I’m talking about aesthetically rather than for health. Like you said, being healthy doesn’t always equate to being the best you can be aesthetically, so I could still be healthy but just lose everything I worked for in terms of appearance?

Also, it did kinda hurt when you basically said that only poor/hungry men are attracted to big boobs, probably because I’ve always been insecure about my breasts. They are unusually big (I wear a 32H) so naturally they’ve never been perky and I personally also find perkier boobs more attractive. It’s probably true but it still hurts cause there’s not much I can do to reduce my breast size.

My main area to work on is basically what you emphasised; hips, thighs and butt. Question; would it work if I lost weight overall first, and then tried to gain mainly muscle on my lower body, so that my body will look more balanced? So that my top half (boobs) will be a little smaller and then bottom half a little bigger.

Really think there isn’t enough emphasis here on ‘be what makes you happy’. I think a title such as ‘The Most Attractive Female Body’ is ultimately damaging. You may have evidence that men prefer a certain body type, but it is about personal preference, and labelling this body shape, which requires a hell of a lot of time and effort, as the most attractive only serves to make people feel as though they won’t look good and be happy and worthy unless they work incredibly hard to do so. People can be happy with their bodies, and feel and look attractive, whatever shape and size. I think the best message really is do the exercise that you enjoy and that makes you happy, eat a healthy, balanced diet (and eat enough), and don’t worry too much how your ‘buns’ look. If chiseling your ‘buns’ and other muscles makes you happy, fabulous! If it doesn’t then that’s ok too. Life is too short to not focus on what makes you happy.

So I don’t understand exactly what it is I’m supposed to do to build strength and look stronger. ( I’m quite small and thin). I really want to build more butt, slim waist fat and build the HIPS. To get a slightly overall curvier look. Please guide me here! I’d be very happy 🙂 Thank you